In year 2006, BP the operator of the Shah Deniz gas and condensate development project, has successfully deployed and installed the TPG 500 platform at its permanent location in the Shah Deniz gas-condensate field in the Caspian Sea, approximately 100 km to the south of Baku.
All platform systems had been tested and commissioned prior to the April 10th sail away from the Zykh yard in Baku, where the platform and associated seabed foundations were built and assembled. The platform was then towed to an intermediate location some 70 km from Baku, where the platform legs were successfully mated to the three foundation cans which are each 30 metres in diameter and 15 metres in height and weigh 1400 tonnes. The TPG 500 platform ( Technip design ) was then towed to its final location in 105 m of water, where the legs were lowered and then cemented in place. Final installation of the platform over the pre-drill well template required critical precision. This unique installation method was successfully completed offshore on April 2006.
The TPG 500 is a unique achievement for the Caspian. The entire platform, including the legs, was assembled at the Zykh construction yard near Baku. The three legs for the platform and their foundation structures, were built entirely in the Zykh 3 area of the yard, whilst the whole platform was assembled at the quayside of Zykh 4. Only two other platforms of this type have ever been built, both of which are operating in the UK North Sea.
The TPG-500 platform is a large jack-up comprising drilling, production and accommodation for 120 personnel with a total weight of 32,000 tonnes (topsides 22,000 tonnes, legs and foundations 10,000 tonnes). The platform’s drilling facilities are capable of drilling wells with a length of over 7 km and with an outreach of more than 3 km, while its production facilities are capable of processing approximately 1 billion cubic feet (28.5 million cm) of gas and 60 thousand barrels (8000 tonnes) of condensate per day. Gas and condensate from the field will be transported via sub sea pipelines to the Sangachal terminal.
It is the culmination of three years of hard work by over 5000 people, many countries from Singapore, Norway, France, Germany, USA, Turkey to Azerbaijan involved in the design, fabrication, construction, transportation and hook up and commissioning. At the peak of construction activities Zykh employed approximately 3500 people more than 80% of whom were Azerbaijani nationals. Their performance has been exceptional, both in terms of safety and of quality. Prior to sail away the Zykh yard had completed more than 13 million man hours without a lost time accident. In addition, the project utilized the services of some 257 local companies for provision of equipment, material and other services to the yard.
The parties to the Shah Deniz Production Sharing Agreement (PSA) are: BP (operator – 25,5%), Statoil (25,5%), the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR – 10%), LUKoil (10%), NICO (10%), Total (10%), and TPAO (9%).
THE secret of a successful leader in Asian companies lies in the answer to four questions:
Where are we going?
How do we get there?
What is work like when we get there?
Who stays and who goes?
By answering these questions and taking the subsequent actions, an effective business leader devotes attention to a crucial set of institutional and organisational processes, two American management gurus behind a book, 'Asian Leadership: What Works' says.
If you, as a leader, only focus on a few of these factors and have not delegated the remaining factors to skilled and trusted colleagues, these blind spots will eventually pose a profound risk to your company.
Ulrich is Professor of Business at Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan, while Sutton is Professor of Management Science at Stanford Engineering School say the answer to the four questions are found in eight factors that those at the discussion deemed most essential to their success, along with the skills required to accomplish these actions.
The factors are:
1) creating customer-centric actions;
2) implementing strategy;
3) getting past the past;
4) governing through decision making;
5) inspiring collective meaning making;
6) capitalising on capability;
7) developing careers;
8) and generating leaders.
Along with the four questions, these eight factors are especially crucial to being a successful leader in Asian companies. The factors cover the distinct challenges of the Asian setting; the role of the leader; the competencies they must show; the paradoxes they manage; and the actions required to get there.
In creating customer-centric actions, leaders must spend time with customers in emerging and new markets - and find ways to understand and satisfy unmet needs of both existing and potential customers.
When it comes to implementing strategy, Asian leaders must know how to dream - and make the dream come true. Asian leaders need to have the creativity to discern an unknown future and build the agility or capacity to act to get there.
Tradition and old ways may hamper their thoughts and actions, so they must learn to manage that. But this should not amount to dumping the cultural heritage of the country they operate in.
Asian leaders would have to master the skills of respecting traditions without being so strongly bound to them that their company's performance, and their people's well-being suffer.
In making decisions - the governing through decision making factor - Asian leaders are required to do it in a way that help their organisations simultaneously leverage scale and size and deliver on a sense of small and focused. At the same time, they must also build a governance process that deals with relationships (who is involved in the decision), roles (what positions and roles shape decisions) and rationality (what are the criteria for the decisions).
To retain talent, which is an especially scarce commodity in Asia, Asian leaders need to help employees make their work meaningful or purposeful. When employees believe in their work not only for financial gain, they offer more of their discretionary energy to doing their work well. This means managing beyond skills and rationality, and making sure that employees feel emotionally connected to the company.
Other steps for building talent retention include :
- Grow competencies, situationally. Look for opportunities to put people into challenging situations where their skills and competencies will grow.
- Meet one-on-one, routinely. Conduct regular, but brief one-on-one meetings between manager/leaders and direct reports. Begin by asking, “What’s on your mind?”– then listen and act.
- Make retention everyone ’ s respon sibility. Encourage all members of the work group to feel responsible for the retention of their peers and to be alert to problems that can be fixed.
- Be a career builder. Talk to people about their long-term career aspirations and help them use or build the skills and competencies they need for the future.
- Help people get an “ A ” . Give the gift of being clear about what an “A”level performance looks like.
- Manage the meaning of change. Move toward people in uncertain times, including personal and organisational change. Be there and be open. Check in with people often.
- Walk your talk. Be aware that people are always watching and assessing you and your actions as a leader.
Helping staff to build and manage their careers and putting in place the next generation leaders, another two factors that go into making a successful Asian leader, would be in the job description of any leader.
But to manage the paradox of individual and collective action is rather a unique challenge in the Asian context.
Asian leaders have to help individual employees develop and apply their distinct talents and abilities to be productive and creative. Yet at the same time, they have to get them to work as a team.
'There are times when Asian employees submit their personal identity to the collective, but doing so undermines the ability to do creative work or to see a complex decision from multiple perspectives,' Ulrich and Sutton say. When this happens, Asian leaders need to adopt and invent ways to encourage individual thinking, constructive disagreement and solutions that weave together diverse and, perhaps, clashing perspectives.
At other times, as when collective action is called for to achieve a common goal, individual employees who put themselves above their teams can undermine performance.
Jack up drilling rigs represent about 60% of the worldwide Mobile Offshore Drilling Units (MODU's) fleet. Compared to other type of drilling rigs, the jackup is rather special since it involves specific problems such as leg penetration, punch through and moving with the legs fully raised during the ocean or field tow, dry or wet.
The intent of this information is to introduce the basic concepts, which have involved the operational aspects of drilling jack ups. There are many recommendations in the specific Rig Operations Manual and they are a result of the analysis and compilation of the rig specific set out by each individual rig operator.
Historically the JU was built to operate in mild environments up to 250ft of water depth. The modern largest JU's are built to operate world wide with at present up to maximum water depth up to 450ft.
ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF A JACK-UP :
In comparison to semi-submersibles, a jack-up has some definite Advantages:
a) Lower construction costs. A semi drilling rig is probably about 2 to 2.5 times of a jackup.
b) Less personnel required to run the rig. A semi has about 2 times the numbers of jackup crew personnel.
c) Because of (a) and (b) lower day rates. A jackup day rates is about half the semi.
d) The possibility to work over a fixed platform.
e) It is cheaper for the operator to use a jack-up:
Less power full boats to move the rig. No mooring system required -no lost time to run anchors.
Less maintenance costs. Surface BOP without sub sea system. Simple well head assembly. However, some semis' have thrusters installed for DP mooring.
f) Less down time:
No wait on weather due to motions.
Drilling equipment can be handled faster and easier.
However, the jack-up’s have some Disadvantages:
a) Limited water depth. The maximum water depth for the largest JU is 450ft. Semis' can work up to 10,000 feet water depth while afloat.
b) Depends on bottom soil condition. The bottom soil conditions may cause a punch through or deep leg penetration.
c) In case of a blow-out the rig can not move off location. For semi, the riser could be disconnected and move away from the location, if emergency case.
d) More fragile. Many incidents and damages during moving and because of a punch through. Statistics have shown that over 75% of the incidents occur under tow or during jack-up/jack-down operations.
e) Safe operations require strict procedures and many different ways of preloading the rigs to ensure that the rig is spudded firmly on the seabed before it is jackup to the operational airgap, usually ranging 30-60 feet airgap.
Introduction to rig equipment at drillfloor,etc :-
Offshore Rig HVAC System: - The purpose of air conditioning system is to provide a comfortable working and living environment for crew & personnel on board the semi or jackup rigs, and to maintain acceptable conditions for operation of electrical equipment in the switchboard room.
Mechanical: - The Air-conditioning system for Living Quarters and SCR Room could be a refrigerant direct expansion type or chilled water system. Quarters Air conditioning system consists of two Condensing Units- Seawater cooled type. Three AHUs with direct expansion type cooling coils, serving accommodations respectively in Upper & Main deck, Tween & Lower deck (Port and Stbd). The AHUs could be provided with build-in heaters (3-steps control) and humidifiers to maintenance required room temperature and humidity.
The air conditioning system for SCR Room may consists of two Condensing Units-Seawater cooled type for direct expansion type coils, located in AHU room at Lower deck and operate only in cooling mode.
Condensing units for Air conditioning system and for SCR Room use R-134a Refrigerant, Window and Split conditioners use R22 however this refrigerant type will not be allowed by year 2020 and all existing units to be charged with new CFC free refrigerant. The quarter system is designed to maintain overpressure in passageways. Each cabin maybe equipped with reheater and room thermostat for individual temperature control depending on the area where the rig operates, usually you do not need them in the Gulf of Mexico except those north sea or colder climate.
Ventilation Fans are installed in the quarters to exhaust air from Galley Hood, Sanitary, Laundry, Change Rooms, Sick Bay & Clinic, Coffee Shop, Recreation Room, Fan Rooms and to supply fresh air to Galley and Fan Rooms. Classification requires galley AHU to be dedicated unit and not shared with other aircon spaces, cabin, public areas.
Rig Cold room and freezer System :- The purpose of the refrigeration systems are to cool down and maintain a reduced room temperature in the freezer room (-25 / -22 degC), cold room (-1 / +2 degC) and vegetable room (+8 / +11 degC) for preservation of foodstuffs. These store food rations for crew consumption onboard and usually these last for about 2-3weeks before they are replenish from supply vessels to the operating rigs.
Mechanical :- The refrigeration systems consist of three (3) evaporator units, one located in each of the freezer room, cold room and vegetable rooms, and two (2) condenser units, located in the fan room no. 1 on lower deck.
Piping :- R-404a refrigerant for the refrigeration systems is piped from each evaporating unit to the condensing units. The condensing units are seawater cooled using the vessel sea water service / cooling system.
Electrical installations are present in any ship, from powering of communication and navigation equipment, alarm and monitoring system, running of motors for pumps, fans or winches, to high power installation for electric propulsion.
Electric propulsion is an emerging area where various competence areas meet. Successful solutions for vessels with electric propulsion are found in environments where naval architects, hydrodynamic and propulsion engineers, and electrical engineering expertise cooperate under constructional, operational, and economical considerations. Optimized design and compromises can only be achieved with a common concept language and mutual understanding of the different subjects.
Electric propulsion with gas turbine or diesel engine driven power generation is used in hundreds of ships of various types and in a large variety of configurations. Installed electric propulsion power in merchant marine vessels was in 2002 in the range of 6-7 GW (Gigawatt), in addition to a substantial installation in both submarine and surface war ship applications.
By introduction of azimuthing thrusters and podded thrust units, propulsion configurations for transit, maneuvering and station keeping have in several types of vessels merged in order to utilize installed thrust units optimally for transit, maneuvering and dynamically positioning (dynamic positioning - DP).
At present, electric propulsion is applied mainly in following type of ships: Cruise vessels, ferries, DP drilling vessels, thruster assisted moored floating production facilities, shuttle tankers, cable layers, pipe layers, icebreakers and other ice going vessels, supply vessels, and war ships. There is also a significant on-going research and evaluation of using electric propulsion in new vessel designs for existing and new application areas.
The following characteristics summarize the main advantages of electric propulsion in these types of vessels:
- Improved life cycle cost by reduced fuel consumption and maintenance, especially where there is a large variation in load demand. E.g. for many DP vessels a typically operational profile is equally divided between transit and station keeping/maneuvering operations.
- Reduced vulnerability to single failure in the system and possibility to optimize loading of prime movers diesel engine or gas turbine).
- Light high/medium speed diesel engines.
- Less space consuming and more flexible utilization of the on-board space increase the payload of the vessel
- Flexibility in location of thruster devices because the thruster is supplied with electric power through cables, and can be located very independent on the location of the prime mover.
- Improved maneuverability by utilizing azimuthing thrusters or podded propulsion.
- Less propulsion noise and vibrations since rotating shaft lines are shorter, prime movers are running on fixed
speed, and using pulling type propellers gives less cavitation due to more uniform water flow.
These advantages should be weighted up against the present penalties, such as:
- Increased investment costs. However, this is continuously subject for revisions, as the cost tends to decrease with increasing number of units manufactured.
- Additional components (electrical equipment – generators, transformers, drives and motors/machines)between prime mover and propeller increase the transmission losses at full load.
- For newcomers a higher number and new type of equipment requires different operation, manning, and
maintenance strategy.
High availability of power, propulsion and thruster installations, as well as safety and automation systems, are the key factors in obtaining maximum operation time for the vessel. The safety and automation system required to monitor, protect, and control the power plant, propulsion and thruster system, becomes of increasing importance for a reliable and optimum use of the installation.
The advantages of diesel-electric propulsion can be summarized as follows:
- Lower fuel consumption and emissions due to the possibility to optimize the loading of diesel engines / gensets. The gensets in operation can run on high loads with high engine efficiency.
This applies especially to vessels which have a large variation in power demand, for example for an offshore supply vessel, which divides its time between transit and station-keeping (DP) operation.
- Better hydrodynamic efficiency of the propeller. Usually Diesel-electric propulsion plants operate a FP-propeller via a variable speed drive. As the propeller operates always on design pitch, in low speed sailing its efficiency is increased when running at lower revolution compared to a constant speed driven CP-propeller. This also contributes to a lower fuel consumption and less emission for a Diesel-electric propulsion plant.
- High reliability, due to multiple engine redundancy. Even if an engine / genset malfunctions, there will be sufficient power to operate the vessel safely. Reduced vulnerability to single point of failure providing the basis to fulfill high redundancy requirements.
- Reduced life cycle cost, resulting from lower operational and maintenance costs.
- Improved manoeuvrabilty and station-keeping ability, by deploying special propulsors such as azimuth thrusters or pods. Precise control of the electrical propulsion motors controlled by frequency converters enables accurate positioning accuracies.
- Increased payload, as diesel-electric propulsion plants take less space compared to a diesel mechanical
plant. Especially engine rooms can be designed shorter.
- More flexibility in location of diesel engine / gensets and propulsors. The propulsors are supplied with electric power through cables. They do not need to be adjacent to the diesel engines / gensets.
- Lower propulsion noise and reduced vibrations. For example a slow speed E-motor allows to avoid the gearbox and propulsors like pods keep most of the structure bore noise outside of the hull.
- Efficient performance and high motor torques, as the electrical system can provide maximum torque also at low speeds, which gives advantages for example in icy conditions.
The propulsion system of a DP vessel is sized to provide stationkeeping forces for the most severe operating scenario specified by the owner or operator of the vessel. During most of its operating time, the DP vessel operates in environmental conditions which are far less severe than the ones used as the design basis for the power and propulsion system. As a result, during the majority of its operating time, the DP vessel operates the propulsion system at partial load. The power system is typically equipped with a multiple installation of Diesel-generator sets; the number of generators on-line is selected (mostly automatically by the power management system) according to the power demand of the vessel. As a result, the engine generators operate at relatively high loads, at conditions of optimum fuel efficiency.
The propulsion system consists of a multiple installation of thrusters. During most of its operational time, only a part of the installed thrust capacity is required. The operator has two basic choices:
· Operating all thrusters at the required low load or
· Operating a few thrusters at high load
The environmental elements, such as wind, current, and wave drifts generate forces and moments on the vessel. The thrusters have to generate counter forces and moments to create a force and moment equilibrium. The thrust allocation logic of the DP controller calculates the magnitude and direction required for each thruster to establish a counter. The closed-loop DP control system for an FP propeller thruster faces a problem in that the ideal control would be to control the force generated by each thruster and to use a measurement of the force as the feedback. It is, however, not feasible to directly command force (thrust) or to measure thrust and use it as a feedback signal.
The thruster with CP propeller operating at constant speed is limited to the pitch angle as the control value; the drive motor power is used in addition in many cases. In the case of FP propeller thruster driven by an VSD, the only control value is the thruster rpm. Many DP systems use the rpm also as the feedback value. Optional values which can be used as feedback signal are motor torque (current, Amps) or motor power (kW).
Class 0 was a sort of “never mind” operations where nothing could go seriously wrong. Any vessel that could operate in DP mode at all, could not avoid meeting Class 3 requirements. That class disappeared with the introduction of the IMO Guidelines.
Class 1 operations are those where loss of position may cause some pollution and minor economical damage, but excluding severe harm to people.
Class 2 operation are those where loss of position may cause severe pollution, large economical damage, and accidents to people.
Class 3 operations are those where major damages may occur, severe pollution, and fatal accidents.
With the IMO Guidelines, the term equipment class was introduced, which is an inversion of the concept. A vessel is now equipped according to a chosen set of class requirements, and that will allow the vessel to undertake the corresponding consequence class of operations.
The assessment of the hazard level of the operation still has to be done by involved parties, which include owner, operator, and national authorities.
The major difference between Class 1 and Class 2 is that Class 1 vessels are allowed to fail completely, i.e. lose both position and heading. The Class 2 vessel is not expected to do that. The maximum failure that can be defined is assumed to be feasible, it will happen, and it is not to be ignored with reference to optimistic statistics. Once this failure occurs, the vessel shall still be able to maintain both position and heading, at least initially. For how long this ability shall remain, is governed by the time required to secure the operation.
For Class 2 all failures of a technical nature are relevant, but certain types of equipment of a passive nature are trusted to stay out of harms way. For Class 3 vessels, all of the Class 2 requirements are adopted, and then is added failures that are brought about by fire and flooding events. This latter requirement results in need of physical separations that are not necessary for Class 2.
For both Class 2 and 3, single acts of maloperation are defined as relevant failure modes.
Hence, the difference between Class 2 and 3 is the failure mode definition, which briefly said consists of the need for physical separation of redundant components/systems in case of Class 3.
The typical redundant DP vessel, e.g. most drill ships, are based on two almost identical half systems for power generation and thruster configuration, which are controlled by a dual control system. When done properly, each half system shall carry on after full failure of the other half. Both halves will normally continue undisturbed after failure of one of the control systems.
This solution is acceptable for Class 2, and the vessel will be quantified by the smaller of the half systems, if they are unequal. Strictly speaking, systems are never equal. The thruster configuration will consist of units that will have variable efficiency, depending on external circumstances. In simple terms, if there are two equal bow thrusters, the forward one will be most valuable in situations where yawing moment is critical. Therefore, the most valuable system is not a static choice. This selection is taken care of by the “consequence analysis”, which will be explained later, if time permits.
For such a vessel to comply with Class 3, there must be physical separation of the two half systems, both with regard to fire and flooding hazards. There is common agreement that this would require no less than two engine rooms, with fire separation by A-60 protection. Less obvious is that there should also be watertight separation of engine rooms below waterline, and thruster rooms. The excuse for not having that is often reference to bottom and side tanks that will protect against collision damage. That is not adequate, there are ample cases of flooding caused by inboard water sources.
