SS: Panel- Session on Risk Management in the Offshore Energy Industry, GOM Offshore Platforms-Risk Engineering
Authors: Laurendine Thomas 
Published: October 2008

Gulf of Mexico platforms are typically insured for physical damage and removal of wreck that would result from a covered incident; i.e. fire, blast, collision, wind-storm, and dropped-object. Offshore Oil and Gas platforms in the Gulf of Mexico are reliable safe work areas. The people and well-designed safety devices have been effective in minimizing hazardous releases, fires and blasts that are a threat. Platform hurricane evacuation plans have been effective in minimizing the risk to human life and the shut down systems have worked in preventing significant pollution incidents. Still, the single greatest risk for physical damage to offshore platforms in the Gulf of Mexico is the wave force generated from hurricane winds. This paper will detail the platform data necessary to properly evaluate a platform's risk to windstorm and provide a standard evaluation format that can be used by all to help ensure that a proper insurance placement is achievable.

Introduction

The Gulf of Mexico produces 20% of the United States natural gas and 30% of the US oil. The infrastructure of wells, pipelines and platforms that have been installed over the last 65 years are a national treasure. These facilities on the Outer-Continental Shelf (OCS) have been installed in water depths ranging from eight to 8,000 feet, from south of Mobile, AL to east of Padre Island, TX with the majority located offshore Louisiana. The royalties paid to the US Treasury are the second largest source of income for the United States. The 4,000 platforms on the OCS have all been designed to withstand hurricane forces; however, one needs to appreciate that the hurricane forces used to design platforms have not been consistent. To illustrate this point, platforms have been designed for 10-year to 100-year return-period hurricanes and some designers included the effects of currents and marine growth while others did not. The point is that, historically, many in the insurance industry were under the misguided impression that all offshore platforms were alike and therefore were designed to the same criteria with the same level of engineering competence and the same level of quality assurance. Instead, the fact of the matter is, most offshore platforms are unique and have been designed to different criteria with various degrees of engineering skills and quality assurance. This makes for a fleet of platforms that is difficult to assess and requires the evaluation of important platform characteristics to perform a proper risk engineering job.

Platform Characteristics

Some of the important platform characteristics are available free from the federal agency of the United States government responsible for overseeing the oil and gas platforms namely the, Minerals Management Service (MMS). This free data on platform characteristics consist of:Age; in the form of installation dateLocation; three coordinate systems are given with the most useful being the latitude and longitude in NAD 27Water Depth; feetNumber of Slots; a location in the platform designed to receive a well conductorNumber of Slots Drilled; platforms with open slots were designed for forces great than would occur should the design wave hit the structure