Revolutionizing Subsea Field Development Planning Through System Integration and Advanced Diagnostics

Abstract

Field development planning (FDP) is a multidisciplinary process that is complex, time consuming, and inefficient. Existing workflows are domain centric and involve many discrete software programs, making the process linear, limiting optimization, and often preventing cross-domain collaboration. Although a few software tools exist for parts of the field layout design, no existing software integrates the equipment selection, systems knowledge, field layout, economics, and software simulations spanning the entire planning process from feasibility studies to detail design and optimization. This paper demonstrates how a novel FDP software package revolutionizes integrated concept development within the industry, supporting the process from reservoir engineering through to definition of the subsea system. In early FDP stages, including feasibility and concept selection, operators plan for the development of a field that will produce for 20 years or more, making critical decisions with very limited reservoir information and a high level of uncertainty. Because these early stages are short, operators rarely have the time or resources necessary to evaluate all possible development scenarios, and decisions are delivered with less conviction than is desirable. Hence, operators are in constant search for tools and processes that enable evaluation of more options to help them make better-quality decisions in these early stages, where reducing uncertainty and making decisions are critical to achieving first oil faster. The paper describes an innovative FDP methodology that utilizes the industry's first cloud-based collaborative subsea FDP software environment and provides efficiency and optimization by combining full-field economic calculations with reservoir engineering, production assurance, systems engineering, subsea technology selection and installation knowledge spanning the entire planning process in one visually rich environment. The paper demonstrates how the solution provides the ability to evaluate technical feasibility and economic viability of hundreds of development scenarios during early FDP stages more accurately and in less time compared with traditional methods. The impacts on the industry are numerous and include efficiency gains, risk reduction, and significant system cost savings, thereby improving cash flow and reducing payback periods.