Parque das Conchas Pipeline, Flowline and Riser System Design, Installation and Challenges
Authors: Hoffman Joe , Yun Heedo , Modi Asim , Pearce Robert 
Published: July 2010

The Parque das Conchas (BC-10) project is a deepwater project off the coast of Brazil that has a number of subsea fields that are tied back to a centrally located turret moored Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) host in 1,780 meters of water. The project is a two-phased development where the Ostra, Abalone and Argonauta-BW fields are developed in Phase 1 and the Argonauta O-North field in Phase 2. The Pipeline, Flowline and Riser (PFR) infrastructure of Phase 1 of the project consists of ten flowlines, seven risers, one gas export pipeline, fifteen pipeline end terminations, four manifolds and twenty five rigid steel jumpers. Pipeline diameters range from 6?? to 12?? with both insulated and non-insulated lines. Within the system there are a number of " first?? that made the project particularly challenging, the foremost of which is the design of the riser system. Due to the host motions and the water depth, a Steel Lazy Wave Riser (SLWR) system was selected for the field. Given that this was the first time a steel riser was fixed to a turret moored FPSO, Shell had to design and fabricate a specific riser interface system that would accommodate the riser.

In addition to the " worlds first?? SLWR system there were a number of other challenges that the project team had to overcome. These included fabrication of the risers to tight flaw acceptance criterion to meet the targeted design life of the field, installation of the heavily insulated flowlines, failure of rigging during the initiation of a PLET and failure of the winch during a riser pull-in operation. This paper will provide a high level overview of the Parque das Conchas Phase 1 pipeline, flowline and riser system, the design and interfacing of the SLWRs to the FPSO turret and the challenges that occurred throughout execution of the project.

Introduction

The Parque das Conchas (BC-10) project is a deepwater project off the coast of Brazil. Shell Brasil E&P is the operator of the field with a 50% working interest in a joint venture with partners Petróleo Brasileiro S.A. (Petrobras) and ONGC Campos Ltda. (ONGC), with a 35% and 15% working interest, respectively.

The Pipeline, Flowline and Riser (PFR) infrastructure for Phase 1 of the project consists of ten flowlines, seven risers, one gas export pipeline, fifteen pipeline end terminations, four manifolds and twenty five rigid steel jumpers. Pipeline diameters range from 6?? to 12?? with both insulated and non-insulated lines. Figure 1 below depicts the overall BC-10 development.

Within the system there are a number of " firsts?? that made the project particularly challenging. The foremost of which was the design of the riser system. Due to the host motions and the water depth, a Steel Lazy Wave Riser (SLWR) system was selected for the field. The following paper provides a brief description of the flowline and riser system, design challenges associated with the SLWR system and a brief description of the fabrication and installation of the pipeline, flowline and riser infrastructure.