REAL LIFE NEWS: HOW DO YOU DISMANTLE AN OIL RIG?
by Hazed
The Brent Delta platform, owned by Shell, is an oil rig in the UK’s north sea. It is situated 115 miles out to sea, off the coast of Shetland, and island north of Scotland. The structure is 300 metres high, from the seabed to its highest point; that’s the same height as the Eiffel Tower.
At its peak, Delta produced more than half a million barrels of oil a day. Now, after 35 years of production, it has come to the end of its life and has to be removed.
So how do you go about dismantling such a massive structure, in such a hostile environment, without causing environmental problems?
The answer Shell has come up with is to use a specially-designed mega-ship which will remove the topside of the platform in one go. The Korean-built ship, called Pioneering Spirit, is the length of five jumbo jets. It is currently being fitted with sixteen 65-metre long beams which will be used to lift off the topside (that’s the visible part of the structure, above sea level). The Brent’s topside weighs 24,000 tonnes and is 44 metres tall.
Pioneering Spirit will position herself around the platform and position hydraulic clamps under the structure. Then she’ll pump water out of her ballast tanks to lift the topside, which will only take a few seconds – check out the source link below for some diagrams showing how this works. The topside will then be taken to a special yard to be dismantled.
Shell’s decommissioning plan has to be given the go-ahead by the UK authorities; if that happens Pioneering Spirit will head out to Brent next year. She is very well named because if it’s successful this method will be used on other structures in the Brent oil field.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-business-32844552
