Statoil’s Valemon platform (photo: Andre Osmundsen/Statoil ASA)

Honeywell Process Solutions (HPS) has announced it will provide advanced automation and safety solutions to enable remote onshore operation for an unmanned offshore platform in the North Sea, reducing overall production costs and improving safety.

When drilling operations are completed, Statoil’s Valemon platform, located on the Norwegian Continental Shelf, will become a periodically manned installation and Statoil’s first platform that will be operated from shore. Control operations will be located in Bergen, some 160 kilometres away from the platform itself. Moving personnel off the facility will improve the overall safety of the operations while also boosting efficiency by centralising the controls at the company’s Bergen location.

“This project is a great example of how Honeywell is able to use its technology and experience to help Statoil remotely control operations at an important gas production facility,” says Pieter Krynauw, vice president and general manager of the Projects and Automation Solutions business within Honeywell Process Solutions. “As companies move oil platforms farther offshore and into other remote, challenging locations to find oil and gas, managing those operations efficiently while reducing risk to workers will become increasingly important.”

Honeywell will serve as the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) automation contractor for the project. Honeywell will provide a range of control and safety technologies for the project including new operator stations and critical alarm panels at the onshore Bergen operations centre that will communicate with the systems on Valemon. This solution will reduce the complexity of remote operations and reduce overall operating costs compared with standard solutions.

The Valemon platform sits in about 135 metres of water and will produce natural gas and condensate from one of the biggest undeveloped natural gas fields in the North Sea with an estimated 192 million barrels of oil equivalent. Once drilling is complete in 2017, the platform will have 10 production wells.

Among the technologies Honeywell will provide are its Experion(®) Process Knowledge System (PKS), integrated protective solutions, Critical Alarm Panel with Safety Manager, integrated fire and gas and emergency shutdown solutions, and closed circuit TV software.

Tags: Honeywell Process Solutions, Statoil