November 2012, Vol. 239 No. 11

Projects

Buoyant Tower Set Off Peru

The CX-15 buoyant tower designed by Horton Shallow Water Development (SWD) has been successfully set as planned for BPZ Energy off the coast of Peru.

The buoyant tower is located approximately one mile from the existing CX-11 platform in a water depth of 175 feet in the Corvina field in offshore block Z-1. Both platforms will be interconnected via a series of subsea pipelines.

The design of the platform features a number of specific areas that greatly reduced cost and simplified setting. The transport vessel Osprey, a submersible heavy lift ship, transported the topside and hull tower components of the platform to the field site and also launched the tower and was used for mating the decks to the tower. The hull was initially floated off in a horizontal orientation and then upended with a controlled flood of the lower hull cavities. This process was complete in a single day. Additional ballast was then added to the hull structure before it was mated with the topside positioned on a cantilever structure, also on the Osprey.

All operations went to plan and the combined topside and hull was wet towed to the final location where the last phase was to set the whole structure into the seabed using the integral suction foundation.

Richard Spies, COO of BPZ Energy, commented “The use of the buoyant tower design has been a key driver in the cost effective and timely expansion of the development of our Z-1 asset. We have been impressed with the delivery team and how the whole project has come together as planned.”

The platform is designed for 12,200 bopd, gas compression capacity of 12.8 MMscf/d and produced water handling and injection capacity of 3,500 bpd. A total of 24 drill slots will be available, some of which will be used for gas and water reinjection wells.