An oil platform, offshore platform, or offshore drilling rig is a large structure with facilities for well drilling to explore, extract, store, and process petroleum and natural gas that lies in rock formations beneath the seabed. Many oil platforms will also contain facilities to accommodate their workforce. Most commonly, oil platforms engage in activities on the continental shelf, though they can also be used in lakes, inshore waters, and inland seas. Depending on the circumstances, the platform may be fixed to the ocean floor, consist of an artificial island, or float. Remote subsea wells may also be connected to a platform by flow lines and by umbilical connections. These sub-sea solutions may consist of one or more subsea wells or of one or more manifold centres for multiple wells.
Petronius is a deepwater compliant tower oil platform built from 1997 to 2000 and operated by Chevron in the Gulf of Mexico, 210 km southeast of New Orleans, United States.
The Brent field is an oil and gas field located in the East Shetland Basin of the North Sea, 186 kilometres (116 mi) north-east of Lerwick, Shetland Islands, Scotland, at the water depth of 140 metres (460 ft). The field operated by Shell UK Limited was discovered in 1971 by semi-submersible drilling rig "Staflo" and was once one of the most productive parts of the UK's offshore assets but has reached the stage where production is no longer economically viable. Decommissioning of the Brent field is ongoing and will be completed in the early 2020s. The discovery well 211/26-1 was drilled in 1971 by the semi-submersible drilling rig "Staflo". This was a major surprise at the time as the nearest land in Scotland and Norway is composed of granite and other non reservoir metamorphic rocks.
The Saipem 7000 is the world's third largest semi-submersible crane vessel, after the SSCV Sleipnir and the SSCV Thialf. It is owned by the oil and gas industry contractor Saipem S.p.A.
Mars is a permanent offshore drilling and production tension-leg oil platform (TLP) operating in Mississippi Canyon blocks 762, 763, 806, 807, 850 and 851 in the Gulf of Mexico and was approved by the MMS in December 1992 with production beginning on July 8, 1996. The leases were acquired by Shell in 1985 and 1988. The platform is a joint venture between Shell Oil Company and BP, with Shell owning the majority share and operating the facility.
The SSCV Thialf is a semi-submersible crane vessel operated by Heerema Marine Contractors, and it was the largest crane vessel in the world until the SSCV Sleipnir became the largest in 2019.
Baldpate is a 579.7 metres (1,902 ft) offshore compliant tower oil platform near the coast of Louisiana, owned and operated by Hess Corporation. It was the first freestanding compliant tower to be built following the Lena platform which was a guyed compliant tower. It is the second tallest structure built in water after the Petronius. The Baldpate Platform was designed and built by Hudson Engineering in Houston, Texas, and installed by Heerema Marine Contractors.
Bullwinkle was a 1,736 feet (529 m) tall, pile-supported fixed steel oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico. Installed in 1988, the total weight of the platform was 77,000 tons, of which the steel jacket comprises 49,375 tones. At the time of its construction it was the third tallest freestanding structure ever built – shorter than only the CN Tower and the Ostankino Tower – and the tallest in the United States, being 6 ft (1.8 m) taller than the pinnacle of the Sears Tower. Of the total height, 1,352 feet (412 m) are below the waterline. It was located in Green Canyon Block 65, approximately 160 miles (260 km) southwest of New Orleans. Bullwinkle belongs to Fieldwood Energy LLC. The total field development construction cost was US$500,000,000 according to some sources.
Mad Dog Oil Field is an offshore oil field located along the Sigsbee Escarpment at Green Canyon blocks 825, 826 and 782, Western Atwater Foldbelt, Gulf of Mexico. The field is located about 190 miles (310 km) south of New Orleans and 150 miles (240 km) southwest of Venice, Louisiana, United States. It is in the depth of 5,000 to 7,000 feet of water.
Offshore drilling is a mechanical process where a wellbore is drilled below the seabed. It is typically carried out in order to explore for and subsequently extract petroleum that lies in rock formations beneath the seabed. Most commonly, the term is used to describe drilling activities on the continental shelf, though the term can also be applied to drilling in lakes, inshore waters and inland seas.
Sakhalin Energy Investment Company Ltd. is a consortium for developing the Sakhalin-2 oil and gas project with corporate head office in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. Roman Dashkov has been the Chief Executive Officer since 2013.
A spar is a marine structure, used for floating oil/gas platforms. Named after navigation channel Spar buoys, spar platforms were developed as an extreme deepwater alternative to conventional platforms. The deep draft design of spars makes them less affected by wind, wave, and currents and allows for both dry tree and subsea production.
A compliant tower (CT) is a fixed rig structure normally used for the offshore production of oil or gas. The rig consists of narrow, flexible (compliant) towers and a piled foundation supporting a conventional deck for drilling and production operations. Compliant towers are designed to sustain significant lateral deflections and forces, and are typically used in water depths ranging from 1,500 to 3,000 feet. These structures are considered freestanding but media supported. They demonstrates static stability but have a much greater degree of lateral deformation/flexibility vs land-base structures, up to 2.5% vs 0.5% and are partially supported by buoyancy. It is unknown if these structures could support themselves as built if they were constructed on land. At present the deepest is the Chevron Petronius tower located in water 623m deep.
The Ocean Star Offshore Drilling Rig & Museum, located in Galveston, Texas, is a museum dedicated to the offshore oil and gas industry. Located next to the Strand National Historic Landmark District, the museum is housed on a retired jack-up rig set up in the Galveston harbor.
Deepwater drilling, or Deep well drilling, is the process of creating holes in the Earth's crust using a drilling rig for oil extraction under the deep sea. There are approximately 3400 deepwater wells in the Gulf of Mexico with depths greater than 150 meters.
The Gulf of Mexico is an ocean basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, largely surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United States; on the southwest and south by the Mexican states of Tamaulipas, Veracruz, Tabasco, Campeche, Yucatan, and Quintana Roo; and on the southeast by Cuba. The U.S. states of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida, which border the Gulf on the north, are often referred to as the "Third Coast" of the United States.
McDermott International, Ltd is a global provider of engineering and construction solutions to the energy industry. Operating in over 54 countries, McDermott's locally-focused and globally-integrated resources include more than 40,000 employees, a diversified fleet of specialty marine construction vessels and fabrication facilities around the world. Incorporated in Bermuda, it is headquartered in the Energy Corridor area of Houston, Texas.
Heerema Marine Contractors (HMC) is a contractor headquartered in the Netherlands most notable for operation of three of the largest crane vessels in the offshore industry.
The Hutton oil field, located on the UK continental shelf, was the location for the first ever production Tension Leg Platform (TLP).
Perdido (spanish for lost) is the deepest floating oil platform in the world at a water depth of about 2450 meters (8040 feet) operated by the Shell Oil Company in the Gulf of Mexico. At 267 meters, it is almost as tall as the Eiffel Tower. The platform is located in the Perdido fold belt which is a rich discovery of crude oil and natural gas. The Perdido spar began production in 2010 and its peak production is 100,000 barrels of oil equivalent (ca. 16,000 m3/d) and 200 million cubic feet of gas per day (ca. 5.7*106 m3/d).
