Floating and Production, Storing and Offloading ships have been developed over a 30 year period by Petrobras and are now common on the Pre SALT and Campos basin oil fields. Two of the main advantage of these very large ships is that they can store oil, which is very useful where there is no pipeline and they can get out of the way of inclement weather. Certainly they have a limit in terms of capacity, as one will eventually fill anything up but for the Gulf of Mexico, which has very deep areas where there are no pipelines and some pretty horrible hurricanes. Most hurricane seasons see the suspension of oil production and the destruction of many platforms, which when you have thousands in operation is a risky and expensive business.
One of the latest ships being operated by Petrobras is the BW Pioneer, which can drill to a depth of 2,500 m, a record for this type of drilling platform and can process up to 80,000 barrels per day. This system of oil production requires two sets of flexible connecting pipework, one that connects the rigid vertical pipes to the FPSO and then another set that connects the FBSO to the shuttle tankers that take the oil to the land based refinery. Two of the many challenges involved with flexible oil lines are how the pipes are connected/disconnected, whilst at the same time dealing the high pressure and the other is mooring the top of the vertical risers when not connected to the FPSO.
A whole set of critical developments, which are some of the reasons why oil &gas technology developed in the Brazilian oilfields are being exported around the world and we will be seeing more and more exported around the world.
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