Classification societies need to keep pace with a rapidly changing industry. According to William Sember, vice president of offshore project development at the American Bureau of Shipping, increasing oil and gas demand will mean that more FPSOs will go into service.
Between 2002 and 2020, there will be a 45% increase in oil consumption and a 74% increase in gas consumption worldwide. There will be a 50% increase in the US alone, Sember said.
In order to prepare for increasing production, 30 FPSOs, five tension leg platforms, four Spars, and one compliant tower will be built in the next five years. And tomorrow's FPSOs will far surpass their predecessors in capability, Sember said.
Originally, FPSOs were built to quickly develop small fields. The first FPSOs were conversions from tankers that usually did not exceed 170,000 b/d capacity. Now, many FPSOs are purpose-built for deepwater installations where multiple subsea tie-backs will carry oil from several wells to the vessels, some of which have 2 MMbbl storage capacity. The industry is "extending technologies" with the new types of FPSOs, Sember said.
LNG FPSOs will become a reality as the need to stop flaring is met, Sember said. Classification becomes critical in the deepwater developments, where an FPSO might operate for many years. This fact makes risk and risk based inspections even more important, Sember said.
"When you are offshore with an FPSO, the last thing you want is problems," he said.
03/12/03