Ground Model: A High Value Support to Deepwater Giant Developments Available to Purchase

Some giant discoveries are located in remote areas, far from infrastructure and industrial facilities, and may not have been characterized from a geophysical and geotechnical viewpoint. In these kinds of scenarios, a ground model represents an integrated high value database to manage, store, use and share easily the huge amount of geotechnical and geological data throughout the various project engineering phases. eni East Africa S.p.A (eni) developed a ground model for the recent Mozambique offshore Rovuma Basin Area 4 gas discoveries, where a massive set of survey data is available, due to the broad extent of the development area. In this remote and undeveloped area, managing site characterization uncertainties is essential, since geophysical and geotechnical investigations are still ongoing. The Area 4 ground model gathers in a 3D spatial extent all the geophysical, geotechnical and seismic datasets, implemented on a single GIS-based repository, which covers the entire development area. The ground model depth extends to the maximum envisaged foundation penetration of subsea facilities; soil and geohazard maps provide the basis to define the field architecture and to select pipeline routings. This dynamic platform is continuously updated as soon as new data become available, driving the progress of the design of the facilities, with the growing knowledge of the site conditions, and is also used to plan future survey campaigns. The ground model for Area 4 development projects is an interactive tool providing support in engineering decisions, through an effective management of enormous datasets, minimising the risk of encountering unexpected soil conditions, when not all the relevant data are available.