COMPREHENSIVE DOWNTIME ANALYSIS OF DP-ASSISTED OFFLOADING OPERATION OF SPREAD MOORED PLATFORMS IN BRAZILIAN WATERS

摘要

Oil offloading from Spread Mooring System (SMS) FPSO is usually done by means of a dynamically positioned shuttle tanker (DPST) in tandem configuration. The ST receives the oil pumped by the FPSO from a bow or stern offloading station, and the operation may take up to 3 days. In order to minimize the risks associated with the operation, the shuttle tanker (ST) should be kept within a safety zone with respect to the FPSO, which is usually given as a minimum distance between the two ships and an aperture angle from the FPSO centerline. In order to guarantee the tanker position during the whole operation, the operation must be performed with tankers provided with DP (dynamic positioning) systems. Since SMS FPSOs may be not aligned to the environmental forces, keeping the shuttle tanker in position may be a hard task for the DP system, depending on the environmental conditions. There are non-rare situations in which the ST must be disconnected and the operation interrupted. The present paper applies a methodology based on static calculation of DP capacity for evaluating the downtime of such offloading operation. The three generations of DP tankers applied in Brazilian waters are considered. Santos and Campos Basin long-term (8-year) environmental conditions (current, wind, local-sea and swell) are used in the downtime calculation. The main objective is to provide a quantitative tool to analyze important parameters of the operation, in order to support some redefinitions in the operational procedure adopted by Petrobras. The main parameters are: the angle of the safe green-zone defined from the FPSO centerline, the installed DP power, the necessity of bow and stern offloading stations in the FPSO, among others. The results indicated that due to the large variation of wave-wind conditions along the year, both offloading stations are indeed necessary, since the ST can avoid the conditions in which it is pushed towards the FPSO. The results also indicated that incrementing the angle that defines the green-zone substantially decreases the offloading downtime. However, such decision also depends on a comprehensive risk analysis, since in that case the ST may be kept in a perpendicular position related to the FPSO. The risk analysis is beyond the scope of the present work. The DP power specified for the ST generations 2 and 3 are shown to be quite adequate, since it is demonstrated that increasing this power will not lead to a substantial reduction in the downtime.