Tampen Hot Tap Recovery Assistance

 

Aberdeen subsea specialist “Clear Well Subsea” provided a fast track response to Statoil AS in recovering the Tampen Link Hot Tap.

 

The Tampen Link project enables gas to be transported from the Shell owned FLAGS pipeline to Statoil’s Statfjord B field through a 23.1 kilometre subsea pipeline. The connection and hot tap into Shell’s FLAGS pipeline was completed successfully by Acergy in 2007 and the welded branch connection to the Statoil SIPS pipeline was completed by Technip in 2007.

 

However the trepanning (Hot Tapping) operation into SIPS pipeline was aborted in 2007 after the hot tapping machine failed to perform.

 

Statoil took the opportunity to use the Tampen hot tap as a shakedown for the subsea Hot Tap Cutting Unit (HTCU) which forms an integral part of the Pipeline Repair System equipment maintained in readiness at Killingoy in Norway. Following an intense period of preparation and modification lasting six months the HTCU was deemed ready to carryout the hot tap which was performed successfully on the 20 August 2008.

 

The Tampen hot tap was the world’s first remote hot tap carried out without the assistance of divers and it paved the way for the first deep-water remote hot taps into the Ormen Lange pipelines. These were the world’s deepest hot tap operations on a pressurized pipeline and were performed in the Norwegian Sea in August 2009 to tie-in a new seabed template in the southern part of the Ormen Lange field into existing pipeline infrastructure. Two hot taps were conducted in a water depth of 860 meters.

 

“Clear Well can be very proud of its involvement in this fast track project and in the Ormen Lange hot taps which once again proved the unique capabilities of the HTCU” said Keith Evans MD.