Study On Information-oriented Operation Management Technologies For Deepwater Drilling Risers

Offshore drilling needs a series of key riser operations such as landing, disconnecting, hanging and retrieving. With more time required for running and retrieving the riser and high costs associated with deepwater drilling, the consequences of failure escalate. Analysis, design and operation management technologies for drilling risers are receiving increasing attention as offshore drilling moves into deeper waters and areas. At present analysis and design of deepwater drilling risers are dependent on general analysis software in China, there is some special analysis software abroad, but its functions are insufficient to achieve the goal of information-oriented operation management of deepwater drilling risers.This paper is sponsored by sub-project of national"863 Program":"Technologies in Deepwater Riser and Wellhead", sub-project of National science and technology major special project:"Reasearch on Deepwater Drilling Riser Operation Techniques & Software Development"and central colleges and universities fundamental research fund project:"Fundamental Research on Risk Control Techniques Application for Deepwater Oil and Gas exploitation in South China Sea", research was carried on information-oriented operation management technologies for deepwater drilling risers and development of corresponding software system. The research findings can provide theoretical foundation and technical support for the operations of deepwater drilling risers in South China Sea.Finite element modeling of riser system was proposed, static finite element equations and dynamic finite element equations were derived based on simplification of riser system. Stiffness matrix, mass matrix, load matrix and convergence criteria of the equation were discussed, approaches to solving the finite element equation were studied. Methods of riser system optimization design, top tension calculation and operating envelope detemination were researched. Real-time inspection and operation advice methods of riser system were studied. Based on this, Information-oriented Operation Management System for Deepwater Drilling Risers was developed using MATLAB and VC++ 6.0. The software system was composed of database module, simulation module, toptension optimization module, configuration optimization module, operating envelope calculation modual and operation monitoring & guidance module, the simulation module (core solver) of the system was developed using finite element method. Eventually the integration of finite element analysis, design and operation guidance of deepwater drilling risers was achieved. Testing plan of the software system was designed and used to test the program. Finally, application examples of information-oriented operation management system for deepwater drilling risers were presented to compare it with FEA software ABAQUS, which shows that the results of the software agree well with those of ABAQUS.