A Critical Assessment of Deepwater Gulf of Mexico Floating Platform Engineering, Procurement, Construction and Installation EPCI Contracting Strategies and Cycle Times

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard B. D'Souza ◽  
Shiladitya Basu
Keyword(s):  
Gulf Of Mexico ◽  
Reservoir Characterization ◽  
Critical Assessment ◽  
Floating Platform ◽  
Field Development ◽  
Cycle Times ◽  
Oil Companies ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Us ◽  
Water Depths

Abstract A major objective of a greenfield deepwater field development with a host platform, is to achieve the first production milestone set at project sanction. A field development consists of subsurface characterization, reservoir depletion, drilling and completion, subsea production system, host platform and export system. Of these, the floating host platform is a major capital expense and presents a significant execution challenge. Over fifty deepwater floating platforms have been installed in the US Gulf of Mexico (GoM) since 1986, representing the four major platform options; spars, semisubmersibles, Tension Leg Platforms (TLPs) and Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) platforms, operated by International, Independent and National Oil Companies. They are installed in water depths ranging from 500 m to 3,000 m, with production capacities from 40,000 to over 250,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boepd). Over this period the technologies, operator, and supply chain capabilities to execute deepwater projects have matured. An operator embarking on a deepwater project must credibly benchmark cycle times for sequential field development stages (Appraise, Select, Define and Execute). Many variables determine these cycle times including reservoir characterization, fluid properties, estimated recovery, location, access to pipeline networks, water depth, subsea architecture, platform size and complexity and contracting strategy. To provide these benchmarks, the authors have undertaken a critical assessment of ten recent, producing deep and ultra-deepwater field developments in the US GoM, focusing on project execution of the floating platform. Selected field developments capture all floating platform types, several contracting strategies, a wide range of water depths, various reservoir geologies and field locations that cover the entire GoM. The information is intended to assist operators validate cycle times when planning a development, especially the Execute stage. In addition, the paper addresses emerging trends in deepwater GoM field developments following the oil price collapse in 2014 and 2020.

Design Features of Risers for the Extendable Draft Platform (EDP)

2004 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lixin Xu ◽  
Qi Xu ◽  
Colin Hough ◽  
John Murray
Keyword(s):  
West Africa ◽  
Gulf Of Mexico ◽  
Environmental Conditions ◽  
Floating Platform ◽  
Design Features ◽  
Field Development ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Steel Catenary Risers ◽  
Wave Induced

The Extendable Draft Platform (EDP) is a deep draft semisubmersible with an extendable heave suppression pontoon, designed as a drilling and production floating platform for deepwater field development. The EDP supports both top tensioned risers (TTRs) for dry-trees and steel catenary risers (SCRs) for export risers and subsea wells. The TTRs can be supported at their tops by tensioners mounted on the main deck, and the SCRs can be connected to the EDP either by porches external to hull or by pull-tubes internal to the hull columns. This paper discusses design features of the EDP risers, including TTR tensioning system and coupled effects on hull motion performances, riser keel guide design and wear allowances, and SCR hang-off options. Also investigated are the effects of the EDP’s low motions on the riser systems, for instance, the wave induced fatigue of SCRs is significantly improved for the EDP, in comparison with a conventional semisubmersible of similar payload. Furthermore, designs of the EDP as well as riser systems can be optimized for different prevailing environmental conditions, such as those of West Africa, Brazil, West of Shetland, and the Gulf of Mexico. The EDP provides an effective and reliable way to support dry-trees and SCRs for a wide range of deepwater applications.

ESRC Review

2020 ◽  
pp. 657-698
Author(s):  
Simeon J. Yates ◽  
Jordana Blejmar
Keyword(s):  
Social Research ◽  
Social Science Research ◽  
Research Work ◽  
Science Research ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Us ◽  
Levels Of Automation ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Technological World ◽  
Ways Of Being

Two workshops were part of the final steps in the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) commissioned Ways of Being in a Digital Age project that is the basis for this Handbook. The ESRC project team coordinated one with the UK Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (ESRC-DSTL) Workshop, “The automation of future roles”; and one with the US National Science Foundation (ESRC-NSF) Workshop, “Changing work, changing lives in the new technological world.” Both workshops sought to explore the key future social science research questions arising for ever greater levels of automation, use of artificial intelligence, and the augmentation of human activity. Participants represented a wide range of disciplinary, professional, government, and nonprofit expertise. This chapter summarizes the separate and then integrated results. First, it summarizes the central social and economic context, the method and project context, and some basic definitional issues. It then identifies 11 priority areas needing further research work that emerged from the intense interactions, discussions, debates, clustering analyses, and integration activities during and after the two workshops. Throughout, it summarizes how subcategories of issues within each cluster relate to central issues (e.g., from users to global to methods) and levels of impacts (from wider social to community and organizational to individual experiences and understandings). Subsections briefly describe each of these 11 areas and their cross-cutting issues and levels. Finally, it provides a detailed Appendix of all the areas, subareas, and their specific questions.

Punk as Folk: Continuities and Tensions in the UK and Beyond

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pete Dale
Keyword(s):  
Folk Music ◽  
Music Making ◽  
Collective Creativity ◽  
Living Tradition ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Common ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Uk

Numerous claims have been made by a wide range of commentators that punk is somehow “a folk music” of some kind. Doubtless there are several continuities. Indeed, both tend to encourage amateur music-making, both often have affiliations with the Left, and both emerge at least partly from a collective/anti-competitive approach to music-making. However, there are also significant tensions between punk and folk as ideas/ideals and as applied in practice. Most obviously, punk makes claims to a “year zero” creativity (despite inevitably offering re-presentation of at least some existing elements in every instance), whereas folk music is supposed to carry forward a tradition (which, thankfully, is more recognized in recent decades as a subject-to-change “living tradition” than was the case in folk’s more purist periods). Politically, meanwhile, postwar folk has tended more toward a socialist and/or Marxist orientation, both in the US and UK, whereas punk has at least rhetorically claimed to be in favor of “anarchy” (in the UK, in particular). Collective creativity and competitive tendencies also differ between the two (perceived) genre areas. Although the folk scene’s “floor singer” tradition offers a dispersal of expressive opportunity comparable in some ways to the “anyone can do it” idea that gets associated with punk, the creative expectation of the individual within the group differs between the two. Punk has some similarities to folk, then, but there are tensions, too, and these are well worth examining if one is serious about testing out the common claim, in both folk and punk, that “anyone can do it.”

scholarly journals Hospital-Based Donor Recruitment and Predonation Serologic Testing for COVID-19 Convalescent Plasma

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joanna Balcerek ◽  
Evelin Trejo ◽  
Kendall Levine ◽  
Paul Couey ◽  
Zoe V Kornberg ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Blood Donation ◽  
High Titer ◽  
Igg Antibodies ◽  
Serologic Testing ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Us ◽  
Polymerase Chain ◽  
Igg Level ◽  
Donor Recruitment ◽  
Selection Of

Abstract Objectives Serologic testing for antibodies to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in potential donors of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) convalescent plasma (CCP) may not be performed until after blood donation. A hospital-based recruitment program for CCP may be an efficient way to identify potential donors prospectively Methods Patients who recovered from known or suspected COVID-19 were identified and recruited through medical record searches and public appeals in March and April 2020. Participants were screened with a modified donor history questionnaire and, if eligible, were asked for consent and tested for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies (IgG and IgM). Participants positive for SARS-CoV-2 IgG were referred for CCP collection. Results Of 179 patients screened, 128 completed serologic testing and 89 were referred for CCP donation. IgG antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 were detected in 23 of 51 participants with suspected COVID-19 and 66 of 77 participants with self-reported COVID-19 confirmed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The anti–SARS-CoV-2 IgG level met the US Food and Drug Administration criteria for “high-titer” CCP in 39% of participants confirmed by PCR, as measured by the Ortho VITROS IgG assay. A wide range of SARS-CoV-2 IgG levels were observed. Conclusions A hospital-based CCP donor recruitment program can prospectively identify potential CCP donors. Variability in SARS-CoV-2 IgG levels has implications for the selection of CCP units for transfusion.

scholarly journals Citizen views on genome editing: effects of species and purpose

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gesa Busch ◽  
Erin Ryan ◽  
Marina A. G. von Keyserlingk ◽  
Daniel M. Weary
Keyword(s):  
Disease Resistance ◽  
Product Quality ◽  
Genome Editing ◽  
Total Sample ◽  
Moral Foundations ◽  
Perceived Risks ◽  
Public Response ◽  
The Public ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Us

AbstractPublic opinion can affect the adoption of genome editing technologies. In food production, genome editing can be applied to a wide range of applications, in different species and with different purposes. This study analyzed how the public responds to five different applications of genome editing, varying the species involved and the proposed purpose of the modification. Three of the applications described the introduction of disease resistance within different species (human, plant, animal), and two targeted product quality and quantity in cattle. Online surveys in Canada, the US, Austria, Germany and Italy were carried out with a total sample size of 3698 participants. Using a between-subject design, participants were confronted with one of the five applications and asked to decide whether they considered it right or wrong. Perceived risks, benefits, and the perception of the technology as tampering with nature were surveyed and were complemented with socio-demographics and a measure of the participants’ moral foundations. In all countries, participants evaluated the application of disease resistance in humans as most right to do, followed by disease resistance in plants, and then in animals, and considered changes in product quality and quantity in cattle as least right to do. However, US and Italian participants were generally more positive toward all scenarios, and German and Austrian participants more negative. Cluster analyses identified four groups of participants: ‘strong supporters’ who saw only benefits and little risks, ‘slight supporters’ who perceived risks and valued benefits, ‘neutrals’ who showed no pronounced opinion, and ‘opponents’ who perceived higher risks and lower benefits. This research contributes to understanding public response to applications of genome editing, revealing differences that can help guide decisions related to adoption of these technologies.

Developing High-Resolution Channel to Basin-Scale Unstructured Grid Hydrodynamic Models for Tide/Storm Predictions in the US East and Gulf of Mexico Coasts

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
María Teresa Contreras Vargas ◽  
Joannes Westerink ◽  
Damrongsak Wirasaet ◽  
William Pringle ◽  
Edward Myers ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
High Resolution ◽  
Gulf Of Mexico ◽  
Unstructured Grid ◽  
Hydrodynamic Models ◽  
Basin Scale ◽  
The Us

Investment in the agricultural sector as a way to solve food security problems in developing countries: the example of investment activity of the US agribusiness

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elena Stepanovna Ustinovich ◽  
Tatyana Petrovna Boldyreva
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Agricultural Sector ◽  
International Investment ◽  
Investment Activity ◽  
Agricultural Investment ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Us ◽  
The World ◽  
Potential Benefits

It is clear to everyone that investment in the agricultural sector in developing countries is one of the most effective ways to reduce poverty and hunger in the world. Agricultural investment can generate a wide range of development opportunities. However, these benefi ts cannot be expected to arise automatically. Some forms of large-scale investment pose significant risks to investor states. It should be noted, however, that, despite discussions about the potential benefits and risks of international investment, there is still no evidence of negative actual consequences for the countries receiving investments. This article examines the issues of investment activity in relation to developing countries using the example of US agribusiness entities.

The Americanisation of C. L. R. James

Race & Class ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 60 (2) ◽  
pp. 3-20 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Scott
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Global Impact ◽  
Theoretical Approaches ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Cultural Climate ◽  
The Us ◽  
Political Activist ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The Individual ◽  
To Receive

The writings of the Black Marxist-Leninist thinker and activist C. L. R. James are now widely known and studied, although most of his long career was passed in obscurity. His two most influential books, The Black Jacobins (1938) and Beyond a Boundary (1963) now have a global impact. But his work did not begin to receive wide recognition until the 1980s and 1990s. And it is the nature of that recognition, and the ends to which his work has been put in the US academy, that this article explores. In critiquing a wide range of influential theoretical approaches to James’ work, the author relates current interpretations of it to the wider political and cultural climate engendered by neoliberalism, with its emphasis on the individual not as a historical agent, but as primarily concerned with self-fashioning and cultural identity. In the process, the article demonstrates how the political activist thrust of James’ analyses and work, and its concerns with imperialism and resistance, has been set aside as part of the corporate world’s continuing appropriation of the ‘alternative and adversarial culture of the 1960s’.

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