Page 50: of Offshore Engineer Magazine (Apr/May 2013)

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topsides of the vessel, and repairs between October and April. But The expected feld life is 25 on the riser pull-in winch, but this huge seas and high winds are liable years, but there are already addi- then had a knock-on effect on the to disrupt a work schedule at other tional prospects lined up to be

EPIC project. times of year, too.” exploited once ullage (storage)

EPIC “As a consequence of staying lon- Limited access to equipment and capacity is freed up on the FPSO, ger in Stord than had been expect- services were further unforeseen said BP. ed, we did not get the FPSO moored hindrances. Geir Edvardsen, Skarv According to project partner in the feld until late-August 2011,” transport and installation manager PNGiG: “Including the volumes in said McHugh. for BP, was reported as saying that the discoveries and mapped pros- “This, in turn, meant that we engineering frms already working pects, total recoverable resources rescheduled the pulling-in of fex- to full capacity was a prime result within the Skarv area are estimated ible risers to start in September of the delay. to be 20.5MM cu m oil and conden- 2011. At this point, a combination “In addition to the diffculty in sate and 76 billion cu m gas.” of crane problems and bad weather getting hold of vessels and rigs, Potential tie-ins include the dis- conspired against us, such that by there is tremendous pressure on covered Snadd South, Snadd North mid-November 2011 we had only engineering services,” he said. “The and Grasel structures – all mostly managed to pull in three of the thir- vendors say they do not have the gas – said PNGiG. teen risers. capacity to take on more assign- BP said: “There is additional “Then the weather turned com- ments.” exploration potential. Decision will pletely against us and we were In addition, there was a “chal- follow once completion of interpre- unable to complete any more risers lenging bed (space) situation due to tation of seismic survey for 2013 until mid-April 2012. By the end of extension of the scope of the project and the outcome of further studies.

May 2012, we had completed all of work in parallel with the needs “Timing of (additional) tie-ins the riser connections and then pro- for beds for ongoing routine vessel is dependent on availability of gas gressed to complete commissioning, maintenance,” said BP. processing/export capacity on Skarv and started production by the end Despite the delays, the project and is scheduled for around 2020.” of 2012. was carried out with an excellent BP Norway is operator and has “With the exception of “rock safety record, said BP. With a total a 23.84% interest with partners dumping” activities to level out the recordable injury rate of just 0.27, Statoil (36.17%), E.ON E&P Norge undulating seabed, offshore work the project was seen as a huge (28.08%) and PGNiG Norway is diffcult during the harsh winters success. (11.92%) holding the rest.

Skarv feld’s infrastructure is spread over 15sq km, with 17 wells producing into 40km of infeld fowlines, and up 13 risers to the FPSO.

OE | April 2013 oedigital.comoedigital.com 5252 oe_epic_skarv.indd 52 4/1/13 2:30 AM