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The lower turret, ready for sailway to Singapore. for the Rosebank FPSO, which would have to contend with huge wave regimes in the rough, deep areas at west of Shetlands (UK), is even larger – at some 30m wave height in 1220m water depth.

The ? rm is also continuing to develop turret and swivel stack technology for future needs:. “You need to innovate, be smarter, faster, cheaper, deliver sooner and be able to cope with challenging ? eld char- acteristics like sour and HPHT services, novel requirements and even harsher environments, more remote locations, and 25+ years design lives,” de Werd says. “For example, our current turret designs usually accommodates pressure for water injection and gas export up to 350 bar. Nowadays, exceeding 500 bar is more commonly asked and we are developing 700 to about 1000 bar pressures and temperatures exceeding 130° C. There is quite some development in that respect.”

There is also work ongoing on disconnectable systems with and without DP, for early well tests, where operators might want early cash from their reserves but not investing in a full system for decades. Bluewater is looking at arctic, LNG and heavy oil solutions, as well as systems for marginal or stranded areas. “Apart from higher safety standards, cost reductions and challeng-

A 3D model of the turntable and access structure. ing schedules, those are the greatest opportunities,” he says. “The

The Kaombo project started in April 2014 and ? rst steel was cut in challenge is to make sure we continue to be able to understand the early 2015. The ? rst turret was being integrated in May this year, with demands of our clients and locations where they need solutions.” integration of the second due later in the summer. But, while a lot of focus is on technology and system design, having a

The project has strong Dutch content, with contractors and proper execution model is also crucial, de Werd highlights , and they suppliers including Frames, Drie-D, IHC, Trustlube, Gerritsen, and must go hand in hand on complex systems like this to make sure the

Trelleborg. Others like Heerema Marine Contractors (HMC) are also projects are a success. involved in the Kaombo development project.

Bluewater also owns and operates a ? eet of ? oating production

But, while there’s a lot of focus on Kaombo, Bluewater continues vessels and ? oating storage and o