Decommissioning Plans for Fixed Offshore Platforms: A Brief Revision

Brazil began to explore its seas in the 60’s of the XX Century looking for petroleum. This journey began in the Northeast and the first oil field produced offshore was the Guaricema Field, in the State of Sergipe. During the 70’s, Petrobrás found oil in the Campos Basin, between the States of Espírito Santo and Rio de Janeiro, that became the most important oil province in Brazil until the discovery of the Pre-Salt province, in the Santos Basin. As these fields are producing for a long time, many of them are already completely depleted or their production is in way of to be not commercial anymore, and their facilities need to be decommissioned. This review of decommissioning practices of fixed offshore platforms carried out worldwide has focus on the removal of topside with special vessels designed for this purpose or with conventional methods (crane vessels + barge). It will show the benefits of using specialised heavy lift vessels to remove the topsides and move it to shore for dismantling / recycling / reuse / disposal. The cases for study were the successful decommissioning projects in the North Sea: Brent B/D, Valhall QP, Viking, Curlew, Eider A, Golden Eye and Leman, Iwaki-Oki, Halfweg Q1, Yme and Ninian North.