Offshore staff
ABERDEEN, UK --Oil has started flowing through the new export pipeline linking the Greater Kittiwake Area (GKA) fields in the UK North Sea with BP's Unity platform.
The 33 km (20.5 mi), 10-in. (25.4 cm) pipeline has capacity to handle up to 40,000 b/d of oil processed on the Kittiwake platform, operated by Venture Production.
It replaces the shuttle tanker and loading buoy arrangement that has been in place since the Kittiwake field came on stream in the early 1990s. According to Venture, the new pipeline should be more efficient, improving operational uptime and lowering overall operating costs of exporting GKA oil.
Production currently feeds through from the Kittiwake, Mallard, Gadwall and Goosander fields. This should be supplemented in 2009 by output from the Grouse subsea development.
Following arrival at Unity, the oil will continue on to Scotland via the Forties Pipeline System.
11/23/2007
