The New Era of Subsea Production Systems

The first all-electric tree system was developed in 2008. The latest, the third, generation will pave the path for offshore CO2 injection and revolutionize gas and oil production. Enhanced subsea control and real-time system monitoring will strengthen system behavior understanding and operation handling. Faster startups and shutdowns, compared to conventional electrohydraulic (EH) tree systems will increase the availability and enhance flow assurance capabilities. Long stepouts will make the system available to carbon footprint manufacturing processes and materials for carbon capture, utilization, and sequestration. Designed for shallow and ultradeep water applications, the wide range of AC/DC system compatibility achieves cost efficiency. The compact and modular tree system can be used in both greenfield and brownfield environments. The development of the next generation of the all-electric tree system started with an in-depth analysis of the existing EH system. The EH tree was dissected, and components analyzed by subject matter experts. Valve performance, operation, and configuration were analyzed in an interdisciplinary team. Electrical actuator operational limits and performance were explored, and battery capacity and power requirements were evaluated. Expertise in functional safety was applied to develop a superior safety concept in which a detailed failure mode analysis defined the hardware and software requirements. Operational concepts were defined in state machines. Vast numbers of packaging exercises were performed. All of the concepts and subconcepts were rated and compared to the alternatives, and those that best fit the requirement were picked. The dimensions of the development required several concept cycles. Special care was taken in formulating the requirements, and the requirements were continuously reviewed.