Awarded Orders

The field includes a wellhead protector platform and bridge linked platform connected to a floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel and two subsea manifolds tied back and connected to the platforms by a suite of pipelines.

Captain crude oil is offloaded from the FPSO offloading vessel to a dynamically positioned shuttle tanker and transported to customers. Captain gas is exported (and imported) via subsea pipeline to the Frigg UK Gas Transportation System and then on to St Fergus gas terminal.

In 2020, daily production averaged 25,520 barrels of liquids and 3.0 million cubic feet of natural gas.

Katoni Engineering in Aberdeen have recently been contracted by Ithaca to conduct a 3-month review of the level technologies being deployed on the Captain assets. It was determined a polymer EOR being injected into their wells to improve existing water flood systems was coating the incumbent level technology. As a result of this displacers were being weighed down and the radiation beams from internal nucleonic sources blocked.

During discussions with Katoni and Ithaca’s lead instrument support team, ABLE introduced Magnetrol’s highly innovative Genesis Multiphase Detector, a TDR based level detection system using patented concurrent Top-Down and Bottom-Up signal generation.

ABLE proposed the Pentarod variant of Genesis as its open design and flushing connection negates build-up, bridging and crystallisation problems. The flushing port allows the operator to purge the inside of the probes during routine maintenance.

It was suggested that Genesis be installed on two free water knockout (FWKO) vessels, a pressure vessel that uses the concept of residence time to separate three substances, water, oil & gas. A free water knockout (commonly abbreviated FWKO) is an oil and gas production vessel designed to separate free water from oil and gas. This vessel is mainly found in the upstream sector of the energy industry.

Different production fields have their own criteria as to when to use a free water knockout. OEMs most commonly design FWKOs for mechanical separation with baffles and inlet diversion plates. There are multiple sizes of these vessels, and knowing the fluid volume and fluid properties is important to getting the correct vessel on location.

Both units will be trialled from September this year until May 2024 with Ithaca having made a substantial down payment to procure the instrumentation and commissioning services. The criteria for final payment will be the accurate tracking and definition of the free water, oil and gas.

The Sea Eagle FPSO is situated in the EA Field, offshore Nigeria, some 8nm SW of the Dodo River. The FPSO is permanently moored in a water depth of 26.5m. Crude oil is transferred by floating hose while an export tanker is moored in tandem to the FPSO with a Safety Exclusion Zone of 5km in force. The Sea Eagle FSPO facilities can accommodate a total of 170,000 barrels of well fluids and 100 million standard cubic feet of gas per day. The vessel hull has an oil storage capacity of 1.4 million barrels.

An expansion project is associated with the EA/EJA, namely the EA Further Development. This project is currently in the construction stage.

Shell Petroleum contacted ABLE with a view to replacing aged Siemens Clamp-On Ultrasonic Flow Meters with like for like instruments on 3 off crude oil lines. However, ABLE had to inform Shell that the Siemens product was now obsolete and propose a comparative new alternative, the Model ABLE U5000.

The requirement was for:

• Run Down Cooler Line – 12”/ 1 Bar
• LP Separator Crude Oil Outlet – 18” / 3 Bar
• HP Separator Crude Oil Outlet – 12” / 7 bar

Line temperatures were all quoted at 70°C with relatively high flow rates in each case.

Construction materials were to a standard 316 St. St. offshore specification.

Cable lengths between meter and control room based 19” rack mounted electronics are up to 240m.

Shell proceeded with ABLE’s recommendations and both parties are now finalising the details of commissioning contract.

A four-well infill campaign, completed in 2021, added significant, immediate production to the asset. The campaign was delivered with no reportable HSE incidents, ahead of schedule and under budget. This and further planned infill campaigns have generated a requirement for additional process control instrumentation.

Two differential pressure flow meters were specified for gas lift measurement duty. As the sole UK representative for McCrometer, and therefore for the only true V-Cone flowmeter, ABLE were approached for the supply of the instruments. With a successful track record of supply to all of the CNOOC assets (Golden Eagle, Buzzard and Scott), ABLE has established terms and conditions with CNOOC which facilitated a swift commercial agreement for the supply.

ABLE will be providing two-off 3” meters with 1500# RTJ flanges. Manufacture will be qualified as “Special Material” with the meter bodies made from low temperature carbon steel (LTCS) and the cone made from stainless steel. These ATEX meters will be specially painted IAW.

The company’s main UK operations are located at the Harwell Science and Innovation Campus in Oxfordshire (Head Office), London, Risley and Glasgow).

Ricardo recently became involved in odour monitoring at a notoriously “smelly” landfill site in the Midlands. Commissioned by the local council and working in conjunction with the Environment Agency to determine the source of the offensive levels of hydrogen sulphide (H2S), Ricardo-AEA approached ABLE for the supply of the unrivalled Jerome J605 Gold Film Hydrogen Sulphide Analyser. They had previously procured the J605’s predecessor from ABLE, the J631-X, for similar work.

Since its launch, the J605 has become the recognised industry standard for water treatment, waste management companies and regulatory bodies such as the EA and SEPA, delivering high specificity and single digit ppb low level detection capability. This makes it ideally suited for nuisance odour monitoring.

Ricardo will be making a direct comparison of results with Newcastle-under-Lyme Council who are also using the Jerome.

A portable gas detector from Dräger is suitable for various applications such as personal workplace monitoring, clearance measurement of confined spaces, leak detection, area monitoring and much more.

In many industrial environments, workers need to be highly aware of exposure to toxic or combustible gases and vapours or a lack of oxygen. That’s why portable gas detectors and analysers are essential – so they can detect, measure, monitor and react to any gases in the immediate area around them. Dräger offers both single- and multi-gas mobile gas monitors that reliably detect a wide range of gases.

However, Drager do not have a mercury vapour analyser of low enough detection capability and high enough specificity for use in the offshore industry where mercury presents an invisible danger. Hence, when furnishing several FPSOs with safety equipment, Drager came to ABLE Instruments for the industry standard Jerome J405 Gold Film Mercury Vapour Analyser.

Mercury is a naturally occurring trace component of fossil fuels such as natural gas, coal, crude oil, gas condensates and tar sands and, because mercury exists naturally in vapour form, it is readily drawn up by the drilling process along with the gas product, subsequently condensing to its liquid form in various vessels throughout the separation train.

When a pressurised vessel that contains mercury droplets is depressurised, these vapours will start to be released. When breaking containment, despite a thorough gas test demonstrating there is no flammable gas present, the vessel could still present a risk from invisible mercury vapour. This is where the Jerome J405 comes into its own.

The Montrose Area Redevelopment (MAR) is a major capital project that sees the significant modification and expansion of the existing Montrose Area infrastructure, including the development of three new fields – Godwin, Cayley and Shaw. The new bridge-linked platform will be connected to the Montrose Alpha platform – one of the oldest in the North Sea – to provide additional process and plant support facilities. Gross incremental production is expected to peak at up to 40,000 boe per day.

Repsol Sinopec Resources UK Limited (Talisman Sinopec Energy UK Ltd) is the operator with a working interest of 58.97%, and Marubeni Oil & Gas (U.K.) Limited is the sole partner.

The topsides was built at Heerema Fabrication Group’s Zwijndrecht yard in the Netherlands from where it sailed out at the end of April 2016.

Repsol began talking to ABLE back in 2019 about a problematic Coriolis meter on a produced water line and COVID compromised discussions continued regarding a replacement alternative technology for the next 3 years. The Coriolis meter could not cope with the changing process conditions, reporting spurious results or simply dropping out entirely with no data.

After careful consideration and an extensive offshore trial, it was concluded that the ABLE built SlugMaster Intelligent Clamp-On Ultrasonic Flow Meter was the solution. The SlugMaster uses two ultrasonic flow metering technologies and a smart PLC to intelligently select which technology to use, based on the process conditions being measured. Constant metering is achieved regardless of solids and gas contamination. The changeover between the metering technologies is calculated with unique mathematical software, which enables exceptional measurement accuracy.

Accurate produced water/oil overboard dump reporting means that the platform satisfies the regulatory authorities and the client board.

The Rumaila oil field is located near Basra, Southern Iraq, approximately 20 miles (32 km) from the Kuwaiti border. The field is estimated to contain some 65 billion barrels of initial oil in place. Rumaila Operating Organisation – ROO is a consortium between the Iraqi state owned South Oil Company (SOC), BP and the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC). The consortium is led by BP (38 per cent) with partners CNPC (37 per cent) and the Iraq government’s representative State Oil Marketing Organisation (SOMO – 25 per cent). All participants of the ROO consortium are paid a fixed fee on per barrel of incremental oil produced in the Rumaila field under a Producing Field Technical Service Contract (PFTSC) signed in 2009. The remit of ROO is to expand production from the Rumaila oil field. The ROO consortium is required to nearly triple production output from the field to some 2.5 million barrels of oil per day over the next 6 years. On completion of the project, Rumaila will become the second largest producing oil field in the world. Contributing to some 10% of the Middle East regions oil production, 7% of OPEC oil production and 3% of Global oil production.

Brodgar is a gas condensate accumulation located in Block 21/3a. This subsea development lies approximately 41 kilometres west of Britannia and produces via a subsea tie-back to the Britannia Bridge Linked Platform (BLP) Brodgar is controlled remotely from Britannia.

The water cut meter will have 2” 300lb RF flanges in Duplex and the other wetted parts will be constructed in PEEK/carbon fibre composite. It will be installed downstream from the incumbent Coriolis meter. To ensure optimum performance the water cut meter will be provided with ‘live’ density and temperature inputs via Modbus.