Page 36: of Offshore Engineer Magazine (Sep/Oct 2024)

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SUBSEA DIGITALIZATION

Credit: OneSubsea

SLB has been awarded the FEED of a 12-well, all-electric subsea production system with an IoT for the subsea trees at Equinor’s

Fram Sør field, offshore Norway.

“Electri?cation at a system level will drive simpli?cation planned interventions or the potential to avoid equip- of integration with existing infrastructure, moving more ment failure altogether.” to a plug-and-play model for infrastructure led (ILX) re- One of the key changes SLB has made is to go from sources, for example,” says Macleod. a spring-operated on/off system to a battery-operated

This is especially important for tiebacks into busy facili- and motor controlled one, facilitating much better po- ties, where plug-and-play power and communications result sitional control. in much simpler topside modi?cations, much lower cost and “Ultimately, more control and more data enables realiza- much smaller environmental footprint rebuilding topsides. tion of optimization that in time may lead toward more

The elimination of high-pressure hydraulic systems is closed loop automation, as well as more cognitive work- expected to enable operators to go further and deeper, ?ows. This is becoming an extremely interesting area.” improving production and making even marginal ?elds Macleod points out that the bene?ts of increased electri- more viable. ?cation and instrumentation have been recognized across “Electri?cation is in some cases the only solution to many industries, and history shows that once the bene?ts achieve technical, commercial and operationally viable so- are demonstrated at scale, adoption accelerates. “That’s lutions for long distance developments. Using traditional why we believe that the Fram Sør project could pave the systems, it will be much harder and costly to achieve both way for accelerated industry-wide adoption of all-electric acceptable safety and operational performance compared subsea technology, as it offers that industrial, scalable so- with hydraulic systems during, for instance, shutdown lution. It is built on a solid, proven technology platform, and pressurization of the system. Digitalization of sub- while offering lower cost, smaller footprint and simpli?ed sea assets facilitates more opportunities for conditioning architecture. It is also a necessary piece in the overall digi- monitoring, which allows for predictive maintenance and talization effort of our industry.” 36 OFFSHORE ENGINEER OEDIGITAL.COM