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Category Archives: Safety

Welaptega joins FPSO forum in The Netherlands

Posted on May 7, 2012

Halifax, Nova Scotia, May 7, 2012 _ Welaptega Marine is pleased to announce that it will take part in the prestigious Joint FPSO Research Forum in Wageningen, The Netherlands, May 7-11.

Welaptega CEO Tony Hall, will join other members of the invitation-only forum to discuss issues around design, fabrication and operating of FPSO (Floating Production Storage and Offloading vessels.)

Hall is a founding member of the Joint Industry Project on Mooring Integrity. It began in 1998.

The FPSO  forum will focus on structural and marine issues such as corrosion, fatigue, roll, double bottom/single bottom, metocean and rogue waves, welding rules, etc. Progress reports will be delivered on studies on ‘FPSO Integrity’ (MARIN), ‘Fatigue Capacity’ (DNV) and ‘LNG FPSO’ (Chevron).

Welaptega will join organizations such as ABS, MARIN, DnV and Noble Denton at the forum.

Welaptega develops imaging technologies to help operators solve complex subsea problems on FPSOs and other offshore structures.

Welaptega presenting technical papers at OTC Houston

Posted on April 30, 2012

Halifax, April 30, 2012 - Welaptega Marine, world leader in subsea inspection technology in the oil and gas sector, will present two peer-reviewed technical papers at OTC Houston this week.

On Tuesday morning, Welaptega 3D-specialist engineer Marie MacCormick will present a  paper entitled “Using 3D Subsea Inspection Technologies for Pipeline Incident Response.” (Room 600). The session is on ROV innovation and technology.

On Thursday at 11 am, Welaptega engineer Tyler De Gier will present a paper entitled “Manufactured Chain Link Dimensions and the Implications on In-Service Inspection.” (Room 604). The session is on deepwater moorings.

Welaptega will also be part of the Atlantic Canada booth #1817 on the OTC conference floor.

Founded in 1969, the Offshore Technology Conference (OTC) is the world’s foremost event for the development of offshore resources in the fields of drilling, exploration, production, and environmental protection.

OTC is the largest and most prestigious oil and gas conference in the world. It takes place at Reliant Park Conference Centre in Houston April 30-May 3.

US offshore regulator increases safety and scrutiny

Posted on April 27, 2012

The US offshore safety regulator is getting a boost with the hire of 28 more engineers and 48 more inspectors to strengthen safety in the offshore drilling industry.

James Watson, Director Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement, says the bureau wants to focus more on industry safety results than on specific rules.

“The first goal of BSEE is to ensure that the equipment is built and maintained to the right standards, that the people are trained and supported by the management and that there is a good monitoring of these activities,” Watson said.

Watson said  safety should go beyond Deepwater Horizon disaster and take into consideration accidents and incidents that have occurred offshore throughout its history.

The bureau was formed in 2011 in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon disaster in response to criticism that offshore regulators were failing to enforce safety in the offshore.

 

Pressure mounts for separate safety agency

Posted on January 30, 2012

From Halifax Chronicle-Herald

Shell Canada’s recent winning bid to conduct deepwater oil exploration off Nova Scotia has renewed calls to establish a separate safety agency independent of the federal-provincial offshore regulator.

The petroleum giant has committed to spending $970 million over six years in the hopes of finding oil in four deepwater parcels about 200 kilometres off the province’s coast.

The return of exploration drilling off the Scotian Shelf for the first time since 2005 would be in depths ranging between 1,400 to 3,750 metres.

Richard Grant, an engineer and expert on safety issues related to offshore drilling rigs, said while Shell is reputable when it comes to its deepwater drilling expertise, the volatile North Atlantic presents some of the “harsh-est offshore environments in the world.”

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One year after BP oil spill: has culture of safety emerged in offshore operations?

Posted on April 20, 2011

By Gail Lethbridge

One year ago today,  the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig exploded and sank in the Gulf of Mexico, leading to the worst environmental disaster in US history.

It took lives – 11 workers died.

4.9 million barrels of oil leaked from the BP Macondo well, causing extensive damage to marine, air and land-based wildlife, and the fishing and tourism industries. It was 86 days before the spill was stopped.

Welaptega Marine helped with the solution. We built a high-resolution 3D model to confirm the dimensions of the damaged wellhead. A cap was successfully installed on July 15, 2010.

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Cost-cutting, systemic failure to blame for Macondo spill

Posted on January 5, 2011

The long-awaited US presidential panel investigating the Macondo spill has found that a series of decisions made to cut costs and save time contributed to last year’s BP oil spill disaster

A 48-page report released by the investigative commission said “a failure of management” and an inability to identify risks led to the blow-out. The report blames “systemic” problems within the oil industry.

“The blowout was not the product of a series of aberrational decisions made by rogue industry or government officials that could not have been anticipated or expected to occur again,” the report says. “Rather, the root causes are systemic and, absent significant reform in both industry practices and government policies, might well recur.”

“A blow-out in deep water was not a statistical inevitability,” it reads.

The April blast aboard the Deepwater Horizon killed 11 people and caused one of the worst oil spills in history.

Welaptega CEO quoted in Wall Street Journal

Posted on December 15, 2010

The WSJ ran this story December 15, 2010 on aging oil rigs and pipelines exposing Gulf of Mexico to risk. The article by reporter Ben Casselman featured a quote from Welaptega CEO Tony Hall.

“The deadly explosion of the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig in April set off a fierce battle over deep-sea oil drilling aboard huge, state-of-the art vessels.

But that debate has largely ignored what many experts say could be a bigger threat: The troubled state of offshore infrastructure that remains in place long after wells are drilled.”