The King Kong gas field is located in 3900 feet of water in the Green Canyon Blocks 472, 473 and 516. The development is about 150 miles south of New Orleans, Louisiana. The development project consists of three subsea wells, each tied back to a central subsea manifold. From the manifold, two flowlines extend 16 miles to the Agip Allegheny mini tension leg platform (TLP), which is primarly an oil treating Facility. The above scenario required the design of the new equipment using the most advanced technologies (both subsea and topsides). Some interesting features used during the development related to:
- ·
Weight and space availability: to control the pay load to be added to the TLP particular attention have been given to the topsides equipment (use of special lighter and smaller valves, special paint for fireproofing, location of new skids and TLP reballasting to balance the TLP center of gravity), and also to the subsea system (risers with non continuous buoyancy and cold processing to reduce the size of topside dehydration equipment, reduced riser size, use of lighter materials for the umbilical).
- ·
Methanol: due to the small space available, the use of glycol recovery system was not possible. The methanol required for hydrate inhibition created some issues to be solved, including: contamination of the Allegheny crude, storage tank material and stress corrosion cracking of the titanium stress joints in the steel catenary riser (SCR).
- ·
Gas metering: due to the fact that 3 wells were commingled through two flowlines to the TLP, subsea multiphase meters were installed downstream of each well, for continuous production monitoring.
- ·
Flaring: due to the large volume of gas to be flared on this small platform (peak production 150 MMscfd) and the need to avoid increasing the flare boom length and weight, a special low radiation flare tip was installed.
