New platform removal season

by Finn Harald Sandberg, Norwegian Petroleum Museum

Removal activity on Ekofisk in the 2011 summer season began as early as mid-April, when the Thialf crane vessel set off for the field from the Åmøy Fjord near Stavanger.

— Thialf at Tungenes. Photo: Hanne Sirnes/ConocoPhillips

Work kicked off with making safe on Cod 7/11 A. The next platform in line was Edda 2/7 C, where a big and complex topsides was to be removed.

The heavy lifting vessel, Thialf. Photo: Kjetil Alsvik/ConocoPhillips

Thialf has to make two round trips to the environmental recycling base which had been established at Vats north of Stavanger, carrying modules weighing a total of 11 000 tonnes.

This was followed by removal of the topsides on West Ekofisk 2/4 D before attention turned to Albuskjell 2/4 F, where the jacket was removed. Because of its size, this structure was split horizontally into two sections before transport to land.

Thialf was at work until mid-August, making a total of six round trips to the Vats facility which added up in weight terms to about 25 000 tonnes.[REMOVE]Fotnote: Pioner no 2, 2011.