Independent Design Verification of Deepwater SCRs for the Application in South China Sea

Abstract

Through nearly 30 years of design and implementation, Steel Catenary Risers (SCRs) have been found to have the advantages of relatively low cost and good adaptability to floating platform’s motion. SCRs have been selected as the production and export riser solution for Lingshui 17-2 (termed LS17-2) field in South China Sea, which consists of a subsea production system, a deep-draft semi-submersible, and an export riser/pipeline. This paper investigates independent design verification of deepwater SCRs for the application in South China Sea. This paper first introduces a SCR system for LS17-2 project. The field for this project is located in northern South China Sea, with water depth of 1220m to 1560m. This paper describes the design verification methodology, procedure, riser computer modelling, extreme challenges, findings, and technical discussions. The independent design verification includes riser sizing, adjacent riser interference, cathodic protection, dynamic strength analysis, Vortex-Induced Vibration (VIV) analysis, wave motion fatigue analysis, semi-submersible Vortex-Induced Motion (VIM) fatigue analysis, and riser installation. Sensitivity study was carried out to demonstrate the accuracy of the results and the robustness of the riser design. SCR designs are extremely sensitive to environmental loading and the motion characteristics of a host platform. The independent design verification shows that the riser governing location of global performance is at the riser Touch Down Point (TDP) region. Compression forces in an SCR touchdown area can be caused by extreme or survival load cases. Among the fatigue damage sources, fatigue damage contributions are dominated by wave motion, VIM and VIV. This paper finally summarizes the findings from the independent verification work. It concludes that the SCR system design for LS17-2 development meets the requirements of API 2RD design code.