Ultra-deepwater is characterised by high capital expenditures with relatively low operational expenditures and high sustainable production rates – hence high costs for production interruption.

When moving into deeper waters, the economic penalty for delayed/lost production becomes greater. The uncertainty related to whether unforeseen events will occur is also increased as prototype and novel technology are introduced into an operating environment not encountered in shallow water developments.

Subsea well completion interventions and repairs also become more expensive and are associated with longer delays due to increased availability and mobilisation times for required repair vessels. The day rate (spread cost) for a workover rig is in the order of $500,000 per day, and the operator may have to wait several months, possibly up to a year, before a rig is available on site. This will reduce the revenue by several million USD per day.

Considering the large outlay of capital for new technology ventures, which is typically offset by high future revenue streams, we help answer key questions such as:

• What are the pros and cons of competing concepts i.e. TLP, SPAR, SEMII, FPSO, dry tree vs. subsea tieback, subsea processing, etc.?
• What could go wrong?
• How reliable is new technology?
• What are the consequences?
• What flexibilities exist?
• How are unplanned events factored into business decision analyses?

We focus on optimising the balance between potential revenue, capital expenditures (CAPEX), operational expenditures (OPEX) and the implications of unplanned events (RISKEX).

We provide the following services:

• Business case development
• Feasibility studies
• Concept selection studies
• Technology qualification programmes
• Cash flow and NPV analyses
• Life cycle cost estimation
• Due diligence evaluations
• Security of supplies analyses
• Reliability, Availability and Maintainability analyses

Click here to read about our clients and projects.