Oil and gas producer group outlines progress on standardization

March 2, 2020
The International Association of Oil & Gas Producers has published its first four specifications under a new initiative to reduce upstream project costs.

Offshore staff

LONDON – The International Association of Oil & Gas Producers (IOGP) has published its first four specifications under a new initiative to reduce upstream project costs.

Its “IOGP JIP35 initiative for standardization of structural system specifications” follows the previous IOGP JIP33 concerning the standardization of equipment specifications.

It was created with support from the association’s Offshore Structure Standards sub-committee, led by Equinor and BP and comprising 10 oil and gas operators.

“The focus is on industry-wide, non-competitive collaboration and standardization,” said Task Force chair, Simen Moxnes of Equinor.

“We can drive down costs by reducing variation in requirements between operating companies. These supplementary specifications will further negate the need of multiple company-specific requirements, which in turn enables a more consistent and cost-effective design and operation of our offshore structures, across the industry.”

Various industry specialists first selected a globally-applied international standard as a ‘base’ for each of the chosen 11 offshore structure topics.

For General Requirements and Offshore Arctic Structures, a total of 520 technical company requirements have been replaced with a minimum of five “essential common requirements.”

The remaining 515 will be deleted or downgraded to company guidance. Requirements for the seven remaining topics will be addressed over the next seven months.

03/02/2020