The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Backing for new tech projects to target smaller oil reserves
Efforts to make oil recovery smarter
Four innovative subsea projects have been backed by the Oil and Gas Technology Centre as it looks to unlock billions of barrels of crude held in small pool reserves in the North Sea.
OGTC received 29 applications for development support after it issued a call for ‘plug and play’ ideas to target hard to reach reservoirs on the UK Continental Shelf (UKCS).
The north-east centre is now backing four projects it hopes will result in new technical solutions being introduced to drive the industry forward.
They include Flexlife’s bid with partners to develop a standardised subsea tie-back bundle, a subsea modular power network being developed by Glasgow Caledonian and Edinburgh University, a new rigid flowlines system brought forward by Marine Direct Consultants and an academic project aimed at identifying barriers to adoption of new technologies within the sector.
Chris Pearson, OGTC’s small pools solution centre manager, said: “With upwards of $175bn of value in UKCS small pools, we are confident that we have identified ideas that can help transform the subsea development lifecycle approach and lower costs to unlock these fields.”
A second call for ideas will open up at the end of this month.
Carlo Procaccini, head of technology at the Oil and Gas Authority, said: “Small pools represent a significant opportunity to maximise economic recovery from the UKCS and it’s great to see promising technology initiatives being taken forward.
“Technology deployment is key to redefining our sector by reducing the costs of development wells, designing optimised subsea infrastructure, or developing efficient standalone concepts to capitalise on the potential of small pools.”
Meanwhile, Scottish oil services giant Wood and Canadian tech group Libestream Technologies have jointly developed new camera technology capable of streaming video from remote, offshore and harsh environments.
The new system comprises a thermal camera and onboard secure storage and can operate in temperatures ranging from -20 to +55°.
Dave Stewart of Wood said: “By investing in leading-edge digital solutions for the energy industry and leveraging Librestream’s technology portfolio, we are enhancing our service offering and delivering more efficient solutions to customers from desktop to worksite.”