Offshore staff
ABERDEEN, UK – Flexlife’s integrity monitoring technology has been applied to flexible risers at Chevron’s Captain field in the UK central North Sea.
FlexGuard is designed to provide continuous real-time data on the condition of flexible risers.
Luke Wilkinson, project manager and principal engineer at Flexlife, said: “We were invited by Chevron to trial the FlexGuard technology on the 10-in. flexible riser at theCaptain FPSO.
“A bespoke FlexGuard clamp had to be designed and manufactured to fit the riser. This was installed on the riser 40 m [131 ft] below the water line during the initial phase of the project in June 2012.
“Data produced showed that the annulus was not flooded where the FlexGuard module was installed and therefore had not been exposed to oxygenated seawater which could cause corrosion of the riser’s structural steel wires.”
Flexguard can be installed either during installation or retrofitted to risers already in operation. According to Flexlife, there are more than 3,000 risers in use globally, with the number set to rise to 5,000 by 2015. It adds that 35% of risers are forecast to suffer some form of outer sheath damage.
6/05/2013
