Oil and gas offshore installations often consist of many energy consuming facilities including those which support drilling, accommodation, processing, exporting, and the gas and water injection back to reservoir. OfThe electrical power consumption of a typical oil and gas installation on the Norwegian Continental Shelf (NCS) can often range from several to several hundred megawatts (MW).
The NCS is a mature petroleum province and the energy consumption per barrel of crude oil produced has a tendency to grow with time; a similar situation exists for gas. Accordingly, oil and gas offshore installations are facing increasingly tougher challenges if they are to operate in an environmentally acceptable manner.
Statoil has begun research into the possibilities of supplying wind power to offshore oil and gas installations in order to reduce their CO2 and NOx emissions. Many obstacles must be overcome before such a concept will be accepted by the platform operators. A consortium consisting of Statoil, SINTEF Energy and Siemens AS will work together on this project dedicated to the research which aims to identify the technology bottlenecks related to the associated electrical grid reliability. A methodology of using a combination of simulations and experimental validations will be used to investigate the stability of this new type of micro-grid to ensure that it offers a robust electrical supply in all operational conditions.
The research addresses the goal of the Norwegian Research Council (NRC) PETROMAKS 2 programme, namely: reduction of the environmental impact and risk related to petroleum activities on the NCS. The planned innovation also promotes the green growth cooperation with the NRC ENERGIX programme to create radically new energy solutions for oil and gas installations, along with offshore operations, that raise energy efficiency combined with a reduction in CO2 emissions.
Project owner: Statoil Petroleum AS
Partners: SINTEF Energi AS and Siemens AS
IPN project is funded by Research Council of Norway
