Tapping into Oil Over 30,000 Feet Deep

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- It's like an airplane taking off on a runway. You get to a point and you have to go. And that's where we are now. - [Narrator] Deep in the Gulf of Mexico, a crew of more than 400 spread out over four vessels is in the final, critical stages of connecting the Amazing Appomattox Oil Platform to the oil field beneath the seabed. It's taken seven years and 15 million man-hours to get the largest oil platform Shell has ever built to the point where it can start production. This is the story of its installation and how Appomattox came to draw its first oil. - Hello. - [Garry] Asim it's Garry. - Garry, I can see you're struggling with something. What's happening? - [Narrator] Engineer Asim Modi is in the middle of a monumental decision. For more than seven months, he's been aboard the Balder deepwater construction vessel, overseeing the welding and laying of more than 200-miles of pipeline in the Gulf of Mexico. Whether that pipe successfully hooks up with the nearby Appomattox platform depends on this moment. - The two pipes have to line up so there's no more than half a millimeter difference between the fit up. For four years we've been doing all this engineering design to get to that stage, and it comes down to half a millimeter. It's kind of astonishing. And is it a critical weld or a non-critical weld? - [Garry] It's a noncritical. - It's covered by the ECE so let's talk to Phil and also Tom. - Each weld receives a different amount of stress in a different amount of fatigue damage over its life. And so, depending on where it is, the criteria for a good weld is very different. - [Garry] This is Garry. - Garry, this is Asim. Tom was on the line. He verified what I said. He had allowed to go to .75, and so on this occasion, that weld is good to go, okay? - [Garry] Okay, I'll call the tower and let them know we're good to go. - Cheers, buddy. - [Garry] Thank you. - [Narrator] With the go ahead given, the team finish up the final pipe work, preparing for the crucial moment when it will be connected to the Appomattox. - One of the dilemmas is with such a large tree system, 200,000 pounds, how are we actually going to install this safely? - [Narrator] Design engineers are working with a subsea system that's almost double the size of any other Shell has previously used. The team needs to lower the asset, roughly the weight of a space shuttle, 7,400 feet to the seabed, and land it on a target less than half an inch wide. - So, there's not a lot of room for error and we've got some very sensitive components which we have to make sure mate correctly from the tree into the top of that well. - [Narrator] To set the subsea tree in place a giant crane and ROV are used. The team guides the tree a mile-and-a-half down in a complicated procedure that takes about 24 hours to complete. Once the tree nears the target, the ROV operators move from monitoring to full engagement, making sure the tree doesn't go astray and land in the mud on the seabed. With laser-like precision they land it perfectly on the narrow target that's less than half an inch wide. The tree's funnel system then self-adjusts to ensure all parts lock together. - It was a pretty amazing feat but I have a great team, specialists of all kinds who are able to do amazing things. - [Narrator] With the subsea systems in place, it's time for the Balder to hand the final pipeline over to the Appomattox. The process is called a riser transfer and it requires four vessels to perform complex movements, in perfect synchronicity, on the water. - The transfer is dramatic. It's a really heavy load being transferred from one vessel to the host. We pay our chain out so the Bylgia can recover the chain. The Bylgia and Balder both connect the chain to the riser. Then basically they lower the riser into the water until we take the load. - [Narrator] The Balder, which rivals the size of the Appomattox, comes within a few feet of the platform. So, the control rooms on all sides stay in constant communication, making sure the vessels don't come in contact. - The most critical point is that you have to make sure the facility is positioned in the right direction that the vessels need in order to place the riser into the basket. - If you miss one step, if you have a lot of weight on it and one of the chocks doesn't close properly, well then you have a potential problem that everything can take off on you. - [Noah] Things can clash so we constantly have people spotting to we make sure we don't have any steel touching. - This is the point where most of the interfaces that we've been working as a team for the last few years all come together. - [Narrator] A steel cable is cut, allowing the pipeline that will bring up the oil to be connected to the Appomattox. - We're all stop. - All right guys, good job. Risers in the basket. - Okay fellas. - Nice. Good job, Paul. - Stephen. - Way to go, Stephen. - When you can safely get it in the basket and there's no incidents and the day is done. It's a good feeling. - [Narrator] With installation complete it's now time to attempt to bring up oil from the subsea reservoir to the Appomattox for the first time. - We're just southeast of the Mississippi, about 100 miles offshore. The depth of water is 7,400 feet and we're drilling to a good four and a half miles down. - [Narrator] Working at these depths is a complicated and time-consuming procedure. - You're working over a mile and a half beneath the sea, you can't reach out and touch things. And then you put a reservoir that's 25,000 feet below sea level, everything has to be done by logs and visualizations and remote operated vehicles. - [Narrator] While the Appomattox platform was being constructed, prep work was started on the wells getting them ready for the day when the first oil would flow. - We kinda did things in phases. We just finished VX2 which is the third well, so we really have three wells in the ground now. - [Narrator] But just as things are looking good to go there's some bad news. A storm moves in which could make striking first oil a lot more complicated. - Weather can be very challenging in the offshore industry. That does have a propensity to work things that are normally safe, less safe. - We get weather throughout the day. We get various status sources that report to us about what to expect from weather. - [Narrator] This information is fed into a computer which uses global positioning from satellites rather than anchoring to maintain the vessel's position. - We have six thrusters and six engines and those automatically change their position and thrusting force to keep us in a really tight watch circle. It's actually more precise than anchoring. - [Narrator] After hours of being battered by the storm, it begins to subside. The crew's calm heads pay off and everything is kept stable until the storm passes. - Everybody responded really well. We all jumped up, and ran into the bridge, got on the phone with the drill floor. Everybody did exactly what they were supposed to do. - [Narrator] With the storm over, the work continues to achieve Appomattox's first oil. - The Appomattox is just about ready for us to take the oil from the wells and now working those to completion. - [Narrator] As the moment of first oil draws near, the excitement begins to mount on the Appomattox. - As you move towards the last bits and pieces, everybody starts realizing that you're close to the end game. - So much work has been done over the past several years. A lot of steps have gone into play from preparation for first oil. - We're getting so close to the end. And everybody's amped up and everybody's, you know, ready. - [Narrator] The Shell team are spread across Texas and Louisiana. They wait patiently for news that oil has finally reached the platform. - Part of the team was in the New Orleans office and of course a very important part of the team was offshore actually making it happen. - Come in Joe. I'm gonna start up motor 2752. - [Joe] Copy that, go ahead. - Alright, roger that. I'm gonna start increasing pressure. Temperature is rising. It looks like the well is flowing. Good job. - [Narrator] Seven years since the Appomattox project first began and taking more than 15 million man-hours, the oil is finally flowing. It's an emotional moment for everyone involved. - The well opened. They said the well is flowing. Everything worked well topsides. We had really stable flow which is exciting. - Reaction was both relief on one hand and a feeling of immense responsibility on the other. - [Allison] There was a lot of handshakes, high fives. Some hugs, maybe some tears. - [Marno] People were dancing in the corridors, jumping with joy because Appomattox had started up. - You don't get too many opportunities like this in your career to bring on a facility in this magnitude. I get goosebumps just talking about it because I'm so proud. - [Narrator] It's an immense accomplishment for everyone who's helped design, construct, install, and operate the Appomattox. - It's been an enormous team achievement but this is not the end. There's a duty now to take care of this asset for the next 40 years. - Personally, I'm very humbled to be part of this project. It's exciting, but it's also one of the most humbling things I've ever done. - I'm proud to be a part of this team. You sit back and reflect and go, wow, what a journey. - [Narrator] Subscribe to Shell's YouTube channel to see more on the Amazing Appomattox Oil Platform and other technology and engineering films from Shell.
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Channel: Shell
Views: 1,050,826
Rating: undefined out of 5
Keywords: shell, appomattox, gulf of mexico, oil platform, engineering, oil rig, oil rig storm, amazing appomatox, amazing appomattox, science documentary, engineering documentary, super typhoon, rig, oil rigs, full documentary, large oil rig, korea to mexico, offshore, engineering explained, tapping oil, how to get oil, striking oil, Houston oil, oil and gas, 30000 foot, oil farm, oil well, appomattox shell, appomattox shell platform, oil rig worker, how it works, free documentary
Id: V2Ubd-ZEGeY
Channel Id: undefined
Length: 11min 40sec (700 seconds)
Published: Thu Oct 03 2019
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