Just what to do with offshore platforms once they reach the end of their productive lives is a decision that every operator must eventually face. This dilemma is coupled with the fact that, as the world's offshore basins continue to mature, larger and more complex production facilities are being installed in increasingly deeper waters. Add to this muddle the public pressures placed on operators to mind the planet while mining the planet, and what was once a dilemma becomes a full-blown quagmire.
Fortunately, as advances are made in platform decommissioning and removal technologies-particularly for the removal of platforms in deep water-exploration and production companies' options for dealing with these structures, once out of service, continue to broaden.
Some of these and other issues surrounding the decommissioning and removal of offshore facilities, both in and outside the US, are explored in a special report beginning on p. 58.
Past lessons learned
The first recorded removal of a platform from the Gulf of Mexico's Outer Continental Shelf was in 1973. Ever since then, platforms have been removed from the OCS at a rate of roughly 100/year, according to data from the US Department of the Interior's Minerals Management Service. Those platforms that are not wholly removed can be sold to another operator for reuse or decommissioned and donated to a rigs-to-reef program for emplacement as an artificial reef, among other alternatives.
Regardless of what the operator decides to do with the obsolete structure, more times than not, the planning behind a platform's fate begins years before production even ceases flowing. And in considering their decommissioning options, image-savvy companies are looking beyond their balance sheets. Although the costs involved in removing or relocating a platform are paramount to an operator's bottom line, most E&P companies today are taking a hard line on making sound business decisions that will have positive social and environmental reverberations.
One of the more obvious scenarios illustrating this dichotomy would have to be the incidents surrounding Shell UK Exploration & Production PLC's planned disposal of the decommissioned Brent spar loading buoy in the deepwater Atlantic Ocean. In the mid-1990s, the company's intentions fell against bitter opposition from environmental organization Greenpeace in a much-publicized and precedent-setting case.
On its website, Shell UK E&P explains that the incident's effects on its operations have been profound: "Our experience with the Brent Spar has taught us that sticking to the letter of the law is not enough. We need to dispose of installations in a way that is also acceptable to the broader society," the company said.
Other platform uses
In an effort to further bridge the gap between E&P companies and the public at large, recent conferences have been held on offshore E&P operations and their effect on other offshore industries.
One such meeting, held late last year and cosponsored by the MMS and the University of New Orleans, was called, "Gulf of Mexico Fish and Fisheries: Bringing Together New and Recent Research." Papers submitted covered topics ranging from updates on various states' rigs-to-reefs programs to the potential conflicts that currently exist or that could develop between fishery resources and E&P companies' operations in the gulf.
Perhaps most notable about this particular conference was the active involvement of representatives from operating companies, such as Chevron USA Inc. Chevron is currently cooperating in a project to study the integration of offshore oil and gas platforms with cage aquaculture in the gulf.
The venture involves the mooring of the 600 cu m Ocean Spar aquaculture sea station off Mississippi and near a Chevron-operated gas platform. The station is moored not to the platform itself but rather to the continental shelf, allowing it to swing in a circle within Chevron's lease area. Chevron, which is not providing any capital investment for the project, has agreed to provide field observation for structural damage to the station while passively protecting it from the gulf's marine traffic.
"The informal marriage of the two industries could be considered an international model to the development of a truly offshore aquaculture industry presenting enormous logistic benefits," project organizers said.