Ceona has awarded a 5-yr contract worth over £45million to independent ROV provider ROVOP. The contract will see ROVOP provide hydraulic, work-class ROV services on board Ceona’s fleet of new, purpose-built deepwater pipelay and construction vessels including the Ceona Amazon and the Polar Onyx…
The trend toward deeper, more remote offshore oilfields is driving step-by-step automation of subsea operations while the oil industry awaits its science-fiction dream machine – an unmanned, untethered robot that can tend seafloor wellheads and install equipment without human intervention…
Inside PazflorBelgian firm VRcontext International was recently contracted by Total E&P Angola to deliver a 3D immersive training simulator (ITS) for the Pazflor FPSO, to be anchored on one of Total’s largest offshore producing assets.The company’s…
Liquid Robotics and Schlumberger have created Liquid Robotics Oil & Gas, a 50:50 joint venture tasked with developing services for the oil & gas industry using Liquid Robotics’ wave-powered, autonomous marine vehicles, which can operate offshore for up to a year without crew…
The newbuild DP3 ultra-deepwater multipurpose flex-lay subsea construction vessel Lewek Connector recently wrapped up her first working voyage in the Irish Sea, laying two power cables and a fibre optic cable for the final phase of EirGrid's East-West Interconnector project…
A technician works on a manipulator at Schilling Robotics’ new regional service and support center in Brazil. The 3000ft2 facility, on the FMC Technologies campus in Macaé, will provide spares, repair, technical training, equipment leasing and logistics management…
Trial runPerth-based subsea engineering and remote technology firm Velocious has rolled out a new ‘mock' ROV that the company says can be configured to any industry standard workclass ROV, including the six most widely used ROVs in subsea construction…
One-trip solutionBaker Hughes last summer deployed a drilling system featuring a TORXS expandable liner hanger package with an EZCase casing bit system to assist an operator bedeviled by a problem zone. The unidentified operator was unable to…
As an indicator of the health of the oil & gas industry, attendance at May's Offshore Technology Conference in Houston suggests that recovery from the global recession is well underway. OE looks back over some of the sights and sounds of OTC 2011…
Turbulent times in the oil & gas sector will be the backdrop for this year's two premier offshore industry events – Houston's annual Offshore Technology Conference in May and Aberdeen's SPE Offshore Europe gathering in September. But that's…
Exploration and production at greater depths and a heightened emphasis on safety could mean even bigger roles for ROVs in offshore operations. Experts say the machines are not just up for the challenge, but ahead of the game. Russell McCulley reports…
No crystal ball is needed to determine one area of offshore activity where spending will rise inexorably in coming years: inspection, repair and maintenance. With one leading commentator predicting this sector’s annual spend will reach $7 billion by 2014…
Fracturing fluid additivesRelease of the new OpenFrac family of hydraulic fracturing fluid additive systems was announced by Schlumberger last month. The additive systems can be used for fracturing-stimulation treatments, including applications in challenging…
Boosting recoveryThe HiWay flow-channel hydraulic fracturing technique, formally released by Schlumberger late June, is designed to maximize production and hydrocarbon recovery through the creation of open flow channels within the propped fracture…
It's been a year since FMC Technologies acquired a 45% stake in Schilling Robotics for $116 million, with an option to take full ownership of the ROV specialist by 2013. Russell McCulley talks to Schilling Robotics founder Tyler Schilling and…