This paper will include a technical overview and progress update on Marine Well Containment Company's (MWCC) expanded containment system (ECS), which is being constructed to further enhance industry's containment capabilities in the deepwater U.S. Gulf of Mexico. In support of that mission, MWCC established two shore base locations in strategic Gulf Coast communities that will house, test and maintain the ECS equipment. The shore bases – located in Ingleside, Texas and Theodore, Ala. – provide MWCC with the ability to respond to a well control incident safely and effectively.
Together, the ECS and shore base locations enhance MWCC's deployment capabilities and allow the company to keep pace with its members' needs. The ECS will provide greater containment capacity in deeper water depths and enhance SIMOPS and controls capabilities. The expanded system will be able to cap and flow a well in depths up to 10, 000 feet and has capacity up to 100, 000 barrels of liquid per day (and up to 200 million standard cubic feet per day of gas).
The shore base locations will house topsides processing equipment for modular capture vessels (MCVs) and subsea equipment. The providers were selected because of their ability to meet MWCC's operational and technical requirements, thus creating a unique infrastructure for comprehensive and integrated support that allows MWCC to carry out its mission to be continuously ready to respond.
Construction is underway on the ECS, under the direction of the Marine Well Containment System project team, and delivery of key components to the shore base locations has already begun. The established shore bases signify an important milestone in the delivery of the ECS, which is scheduled for completion in 2014.
The availability of the ECS – which represents an investment of more than $1 billion by MWCC's ten members – demonstrates unprecedented industry collaboration and allows MWCC to keep pace with its members' needs. The ECS, together with the established shore base locations that will house this equipment, will enhance MWCC's ability to respond to a deepwater well control incident in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico.
