Reduce, reuse, recycle — Decommissioning oil platforms
A Story Map about new possibilities in Energy and Environment.
The global decommissioning of ageing oil and gas facilities is projected to be a $42 billion market by 2024, led by the UK North Sea.
Decommissioning, or 'decom' in short, is a massive challenge in its sheer scale and complexity. But it also harbours exciting opportunities for the marine environment and the transition to a low-carbon energy system.
Read on to find out more.
The view from space
Decommissioning is already in full swing. A sequence of satellite images taken by Sentinel-2 between 2016 and 2020 captured the removal of the Brent Delta platform.
Brent Delta
In 2017 Pioneering Spirit, the largest vessel in the world, lifted and removed the so-called topside of Brent Delta.
As you can see from the satellite images, this operation left behind three legs jutting out above the sea surface. They protrude from the platform foundations, a gravity-based structure made of reinforced concrete, which at the time of writing still remain on the seabed.
Heavy lifting
This is Pioneering Spirit . Nearly a quarter of a mile long, with a footprint covering eight football pitches, you can see why it's the largest vessel in the world. It's bigger than two aircraft carriers put together side by side.
Its huge size and powerful hydraulics enables Pioneering Spirit to haul an entire oil platform in a single lift operation.
In this picture, Pioneering Spirit is carrying a 'baby' test platform (in orange) weighing a mere 5,500 tonnes. However, the vessel is capable of lifting topsides up to 48,000 tonnes – more than 100 fully-loaded jumbo jets!
Dismantling and recycling
Pioneering Spirit shipped the Brent Delta platform to ABLE Seaton Port in Teesside, UK, for dismantling.
As this photo sequence from Shell's close-out report shows, the dismantling process took just over two years.
An impressive 97% of the platform was either recycled or reused, mostly as scrap metal.
Brent on a map
Brent Delta (marked as "Brent D") was one of four platforms producing oil from the Brent field, and the first to be decommissioned.
Brent is part of a cluster of oil fields in the northern North Sea, straddling the maritime border with Norway.
There are many more fields and platforms around the North Sea. Zoom out or scroll down to find out more.
The looming challenge
The North Sea is a mature province, meaning that many oil and gas fields are nearing the end of their productive life.
Looking at this map reveals the sheer scale of the decom challenge: there is a vast amount of oil and gas infrastructure. In the UK sector alone there are 320 fixed installations and over 20,000 km of pipeline.
This map shows UK oil and gas facilities colour-coded by their status:
- Blue for active.
- Green for inactive, abandoned or decommissioned.
As time goes on, we will begin to see less blue and more green on this map.
A new lease of life
Brent Delta's decommissioning demonstrated that oil and gas platforms can be recycled responsibly.
However, some platforms (or parts thereof) can find new uses without the expensive and laborious process of dismantling.
Here we'll take a look at two examples from Malaysia and the Gulf of Mexico.
From oil rig to diving resort
In Malaysia, a jack-up oil rig has been converted into a diving resort , providing an ideal base for marine enthusiasts.
Can you see it on the satellite map? Zoom out to see its location in context.
Artificial reefs for biodiversity
It is well-established that the sub-sea parts of oil platforms can benefit marine life and biodiversity. From the moment a platform is anchored to the seafloor its legs serve double duty as artificial reef, attracting a wide range of sea life.
The US Coastal Marine Institute estimates that a typical eight-leg structure provides habitat for 12,000 to 14,000 fish. And, according to the US Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement, the average platform can support hundreds of marine species.
This is particularly useful in places like the Gulf of Mexico, where the seafloor is flat and featureless – and therefore leaves nothing for marine creatures to cling to. But, as you can see on the main map, the region has also a huge number of oil and gas platforms – more than 1800.
The Gulf of Mexico therefore has a dedicated Rigs to Reef program, which so far has converted over 500 oil and gas platforms into permanent reefs, enabling fish and other marine life to flourish.
Climate change and the energy transition
Finally, decommissioned oil platforms also have a role to play in the reduction of carbon emissions and the transition to renewable energy. Check out our energy transition story map to read about plans to re-purpose oil and gas facilities for carbon capture, hydrogen generation and renewable energy storage.
Conclusion
In this blog post we highlighted some of the challenges in decommissioning ageing oil and gas facilities – and the opportunities in finding new uses benefiting the climate, environment, and energy transition.
We also demonstrated how simple Story Maps, underpinned by geospatial data, can help with the communication and understanding of complex topics.
At Getech we have helped hundreds of energy companies make sense of their worlds through geospatial and geoscience data, and now we are ready to help you. Contact us at info@getech.com
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