From 16 May to 1 June 2017, we carried out an audit of Ringhorne. During the audit, we examined how ExxonMobil is providing for and ensuring compliance with requirements for barriers and barrier management within the disciplines of safety instrumented systems, ICT security, process safety and technical safety.
Objective
The objective of the audit was to assess how the operator is ensuring compliance with the authorities' regulations, recognised standards and its own barrier management requirements for the operation and management of Ringhorne.
Result
The audit identified three regulatory non-conformities. These concerned follow-up of performance requirements, performance requirements and penetrations in fire walls. We also found four improvement points. These included automatic fire water discharge in the event of confirmed gas detection, passive fire protection, gas detection and response time for PSD (process shutdown) functions.
We have asked ExxonMobil to report on how the non-conformities will be dealt with. The deadline for this has been set at 31 August 2017.
Balder/Ringhorne
Balder is a field in the central part of the North Sea, just west of the Grane field. The water depth in the area is 125 metres. Balder was discovered in 1967, and the initial plan for development and operation (PDO) was approved in 1996. Production started in 1999. The field has been developed with subsea wells tied-back to the Balder production, storage and offloading vessel (FPSO).
The Ringhorne deposit, located nine kilometres north of the Balder FPSO, is included in the Balder complex. Ringhorne is developed with a combined accommodation, drilling and wellhead facility, tied-back to the Balder FPSO and Jotun FPSO for processing, crude oil storage and gas export.
A revised PDO for Balder and Ringhorne was approved in June 2020. The development plan includes lifetime extension and relocation of the Jotun FPSO, and drilling of new subsea wells.
Source: norskpetroleum.no