Subsea drilling operations are moving into harsher, deeper and less familiar offshore environments. To avoid disruptive events due to uncertainties associated with these environments, a Riser Lifecycle Management System (RLMS) has been developed for near real-time condition monitoring and fatigue estimation of drilling risers. Unlike conventional techniques such as strain gauges for direct strain/stress measurement, the RLMS measures the vibrations using accelerometers at select joints along the drilling riser. It transmits the vibration data via acoustic telemetry in near real-time to a topside data acquisition system on the drilling vessel where fatigue life estimates for all riser joints are made using machine learning techniques. A proof-of-concept of the RLMS system was successfully deployed in the Gulf of Mexico on a semi-submersible drilling rig for a 9-week test.
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