Alexandria University Faculty of Engineering Dept.

of Marine Engineering & Naval Architecture

By: Basem Elsayed Tawfek Mohamed Abu Elabass

No 22 No 72

Introduction:
Subsea well completions are generally used for 2 applications: 1- Support to fixed installation as an alternative to a satellite platform for recovering reserves located beyond the reach of the drill string. 2- used in conjunction with a floating production system to recover oil from marginal fields. Subsea completions are useful in deep water but are difficult for access & maintenance.

1. Subsea development options:

The well head consists of permanent equipments used to secure & seal the casings & production tubing & to provide mounting place for Christmas tree. It may consist of any number of wells, if the development consists of more than 1 well, the wells may be located on a template, in clusters feeding back to a manifolds or subsea flowbase. 1.1 templates: Subsea template field layouts involve a structural frame that supports and protects a number of subsea wells together on the seabed. It may be extremely large, heavy structures, up to 800 ton, which will accommodate a considerable no of wells, or they may be small & light with provision for just 2 or 4 wells. The template provides guides to assist in the location of the Christmas trees & a manifold arrangement to connect the trees with the subsea pipeline. A removable structure sits over the structure to protect the trees from ships anchors & fishermens trawlboards.

Subsea template

Protection structure

Subsea production templates fall into two broad categories: a- Unitised templates: The unitized template is normally modular in concept, and involves initially installing a drilling template structure prior to spudding the wells. This drilling template acts as the "temporary" guidebase for the wells. This drilling template

spaces out wells to the required position, may support conductor loads and provides the datum on which the production equipment is based. Following drilling, the production parts of the system are installed, either as "flowbases" run with the wellhead high pressure housing, or as a separate structure with flowline connection mandrels and piping installed. Wells can have individual, dedicated flowlines back to a processing facility, or can be commingled in a manifold arrangement (usually retrievable) and exported together in a common flowline. Typically unitized templates are smaller than integrated templates, with capacity for between 2 and 8 wells.

b- Integrated templates: The integrated template is typically more complete prior to load-out than the unitized template. An integrated template has well bay inserts or flowbases installed already, and requires only drilling out and completion before production can begin. Template size can be large, with up to 24 wells (or more), several thousand tons in weight, and a significant construction project needed to build, test and install the template. A large installation barge can be expected to be required. Although initial investment in the integrated template can be large, the "per well" cost falls rapidly as more wells are drilled and completed.

In addition, the advanced state of completion of the template before load-out allows for extensive integration testing and proving prior to the template leaving the fabrication yard. 1.2 Manifolds: Similar to templates, but the difference being that the structure containing just a manifold, the Christmas trees being located around the structure than within it, often at location several hundred meters distant. The manifold is essentially a marshalling point for flow lines & control umbilicals.

Manifolds are relatively light; the manifold can be installed from the drilling rig rather than a crane vessel which considerably reduces installation costs. However the costs of the additional subsea flowlines & control umbilicals associated with manifold can be extremely expensive. The decision whether manifolds or templates will be used is governed by the reservoir characteristics & installation & material costs.

An example for manifold completions there is MENSA, GULF OF MEXICO, USA. It consists of three wells, connected to a subsea manifold five miles away, which is in turn tied back via a 63-mile 12in flowline, to the shallow-water platform West Delta 143. This is the longest tieback in the world.

1.3 flowbase: A flowbase allows one well to be flowed & then commingled with the output from a second well in what generally described as a daisy-chain arrangement. The Daisy Chain subsea wells consist of two or more subsea satellite wells joined together by a common flowline (and possibly umbilical). Valving on the flowbases of the daisychained wells allows basic manifolding to commingle flowstreams. Each subsea tree may have a choke installed to avoid pressure imbalances in the flows.

Using daisy chained wells allows combined use of infield flowlines by more than one well, and may provide a continuous loop for round trip pigging if needed.

2. Control Umbilicals:
The control umbilical is a bundle containing all the required components to operate and serve the subsea equipment. Dependent on which type of subsea control system being specified, the control umbilical may contain required fluid conduits (hoses), electrical power/signal conductors, chemical injection lines, vent lines, and required spare lines. If the umbilical is subjected to dynamic loads from wave action and currents, it may be equipped with steel armoring. There are five types of control systems which are:

Multiplex Electro hydraulic Sequence hydraulic Piloted hydraulic Direct hydraulic

The minimum components required in the umbilicals for each control system are summarized below: 1-Multiplex One hydraulic supply line, one electrical power supply line, and one electrical signal line.

2-Electro Hydraulic One hydraulic supply line and one electrical power/signal line for each valve and other component to be operated. 3-Sequence Hydraulic One hydraulic supply line and one hydraulic signal line. 4-Piloted Hydraulic One hydraulic supply line and one hydraulic signal line for each valve and other component to be operated. 5-Direct Hydraulic One hydraulic supply line for each valve and other components for operations. In case electrical down hole equipment is used, electrical conductors are included in the control umbilical.

The composition of the control umbilical therefore varies considerable from one control system to the next, and it is determined primarily by the requirements of the particular system being used.

In addition there will be a requirement for spare lines to replace any damaged or leaking lines. The total number of spare lines depends on the selected type of control system and the sparing philosophy chosen for each specific project.

References:
1- Angus Mather, Offshore engineering: An Introduction, 2nd Edition, Witherby publishers, London, 2000. 2www.titan.snclavalin.com/offshore/norven/control_umbilical. htm 3- http://www.offshore-technology.com/projects/mensa/ index.html#mensa6 4- www.camerondiv.com/cgi-bin/cam.dll/cam/scripts/ products