On 15 May 2013, supporting blocks for the ice-resistant fixed platform (LSP1) were launched by the LOTOS Shipyard, JSC (Astrakhan Region), this being the first facility of V. Filanovsky field in the Caspian Sea.
LSP1 plan approval was carried out by the Head Office of Russian Maritime Register of Shipping (RS). Consideration of work design documentation and survey over construction of the platform is entrusted to the RS Astrakhan Branch Office.
There are two LSP1 supporting blocks of caisson type (the wellhead one and the additional one), making up a three-dimensional steel structure with vertical walls and one sloping wall. The design of the blocks is basically similar with one essential difference: reservoirs and equipment units are installed in the additional supporting block instead of subsea risers.
An export subsea pipeline for V. Filanovsky field is also being laid under the RS survey. Since April 19, 2013 when the work was started, 10 km of pipes were laid. The total length of pipes to be laid is 358 km.
The placement operations are carried out by SAIPEM S.p.A., Italy, commissioned by LUKOIL, JSC. The project has been developed by SAIPEM S.p.A. in conjunction with VOLGOGRADNIPIMORNEFT, LLC and was approved by the RS Head Office. The project provides for two pipelines to be laid, an oil one and a gas one, each over 110 km long. The pipes are to be first handled by the pipe-laying barge ‘CASTORO 12’ and then by the pipe-bury barge ‘CASTORO 16’ with a bottom penetration of 1.6 – 2.1 m. In areas of weak soil and in way of intersections with the navigable Volgo-Caspian Canal, pipes will be laid in a pre-arranged trench to depths of 2.6 m and 5.2 m accordingly. It is planned to complete the subsea pipeline construction in 2014.
The pipe laying was preceded by considerable preparatory work aimed at oil transfer pipe (559 х 15.9 mm) and gas transfer pipe (711 х 254 mm) manufacture. The pipes of higher-strength steel with an external corrosion-resistant coating of three layers 2.5 mm thick were manufactured by the Chelyabinsk Tube Rolling Plant, JSC and the Volga Tube Plant, JSC. The concrete ballast coating in a metal-polymer film was applied on the production site of the Moscow Tube Blanking Plant, JSC in Astrakhan. All the work was done under the technical supervision of RS surveyors who were involved in round-the-clock monitoring of all stages of the production process in order to ensure the required quality of the products.
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RS, May 20, 2013