The Impact of Offshore Environment on Drillship Positioning and Operations during Drilling the First Exploratory Well in Lebanon

Authors: Mhanna A, Halafawi M*, El Dilbani A, Albulescu M and Avram L

DOI: 10.23880/ppej-16000276

Volume 5, Issue 3

Abstract

The offshore drilling activities in Lebanon have been started since 2020. All studies regarding the drilling operations and the environmental conditions become inevitable. Therefore, the objective of our paper is to study the marine environment in the region where a drillship called TUX was used to drill the first exploratory well in Lebanon. The effect of wind and wave on the drillship was studied using two predictive techniques: WW3 and ERA5. Furthermore, both techniques were used in order to predict the climate environmental conditions during the period where the TUX are positioned and performed drilling Well B4-1 in Block 4. The computed conditions of weather forecasting are wave and wind lengths, speeds, and heights. Spider plots were constructed in order to show the behavior of the sea waves during positioning and operating the TUX rig. Additionally, the impact loads produced from the wind was computed using several models and methods. A comparison between these methods was also done to show the accuracy of models. Lastly, the developed studies are very usefully so as to determine the safe conditions and periods for positioning the drillship to keep its stability.

Keywords: Drillship; Wind; Wave; ERA5; WW3; stability; Lebanon

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