Safety central to Piper B platform design
This paper reports on Elf Enterprise Caledonia Ltd., which has installed a 23,000 metric ton jacket for the Piper B platform, starting construction for the first of a new generation of North Sea production platforms. The company, successor in the North Sea to Occidental Petroleum (Caledonia), plans to lift topsides onto the jacket during the North Sea autumn. The operation will include the world's heaviest single lift, 10,500 metric tons of integrated deck, production, and utilities module. A crew of 600 will work 1 million man-hours during 6 months to complete the hookup and enable first oil from Piper B to be produced during the summer of 1992. The float-out and installation of the jacket came 3 years after the explosion and fire that engulfed the Piper Alpha platform and killed 167 workers. Piper Alpha was one of the largest of the first generation North Sea platforms and had only a passing exterior resemblance to its successor. Occidental says Piper B has been designed to be one of the safest platforms in the North Sea.
- OSTI ID:
- 5752312
- Journal Information:
- Oil and Gas Journal; (United States), Vol. 89:35; ISSN 0030-1388
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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