Brazilian main offshore oil fields m~ located in very deep waters, and potential for new fields is showing perspectives for water depths beyond 2000 meters. For such water depths FPSO units have been successfully used, but risers and mooring systems ere becoming a more complicated issue. In this scenario, Petrobras established a research program to investigate deep-water technology, dedicating special attention to riser and mooring systems design. This paper highlights the investigation for integrated mooring and riser systems design criteria in deep water. The Campos Basin environmental condition receives particular attention, and a multidirectional characteristic is detected. New environmental parameters are also indicated for wave and current Integrated mooring and riser design methodology is reviewed to establish the steps for preliminary and final design phases. Finally, some comments on design criteria for mooring and risers are issued, focusing on the environmental directionality, and leading to the proposal of a riser-mooring design procedure for multidirectional environment indicated for Campos Basin in Brazil. This paper also highlights the necessary research steps to consolidate the proposed approach.
The Campos Basin area, coast of Rio de Janeiro, is the most important Brazilian offshore basin. Petrobras extracts 70% of Brazilian production from the wells located in this area. Daily several offshore activities are accomplished, nowadays mostly employing FPSO's for off production, and arc directly dependent on the environmental conditions, in particular the superficial gravity waves (Violante-Carvalho, 1998) and winds. The environmental conditions m Campos are under review, and many research projects are investigating this issue in relation to the design approaches, design criteria~ appropriate analysis methodology and safety factors for deep water floating systems. Special attention is dedicated to integrated mooring and riser design.
