Huge Gas Cloud Building Around Rig In North Sea.

LONDON, March 26 (Reuters) - A gas cloud has encircled Total's leaking Elgin Franklin oil and gas platform in the North Sea following failed attempts to "kill" a problematic production well, an RMT union official said based on eyewitness accounts from workers on nearby rigs.

"People seven miles away can see a gas cloud coming from the Total rig," said Jake Molloy, the head of the section of the UK union that represents offshore oil and gas workers.

"Engineers have told me that it is almost certain that gas is leaking directly from the reservoir through the pipe casing," he said.



Only have mobile link sorry.

mobile.reuters.com...

What te hell does this mean?
Gas what kind of gas??H2S or natural gas or something other??
if H2s the stuff is highly toxic and can put you down almost intstantly.....
if its explosive gas well, who knows?

reply to post by TheMindWar


OMG......I'm from the Louisiana where the BP Macondo well ruined everything! I hope it doesn't happen there....that's how the Macondo well blew though. They had a gas cloud, then......boom.

"Engineers have told me that it is almost certain that gas is leaking directly from the reservoir through the pipe casing," he said.

An aerial surveillance flight confirmed there was a sheen on the water, which was detected near the platform, and an aircraft carrying dispersant was on standby at East Midlands airport.

Molloy said the outer layers of the pipe casing have been structurally compromised, channeling gas to the surface directly from the reservoir.

"The engineer I have spoken with says that he has no idea how to go about fixing this type of problem," he said.

Sounds familiar doesn't it? I just hope it doesn't blow.




www.climatespectator.com.au...

This could potentially be the most important thread made in the past 24 hours. I first read this, looked at the links, then went to do some research on it. Seems they were closing this well which produces a liquid petrol/gas product which is explosive and not very nice to animal lung tissue if breathed.
Workers evacuated and not a single soul left on that rig. No one allowed close for miles and the workers reported "bubbling" under the rig with a sheen and gas cloud?
150 miles off the northern shore of Scotland, and no one has a clue what to do or how to contain.
It isn't like the well in the gulf. That was oil. They could go in and work on it drilling a new well laterally to plug it.
This thing is gas. Not oil. They cannot get within a couple of miles of it if it still is leaking.
I believe this is a Shell owned well and the pipe lines are BP owned that pumps the gas.
This should be in major headlines around the world but unless you look hard going to a MSM site you won't find the story. If you search in Google it comes up, but if you had no idea this was happening, You will remain in the dark unless it mushrooms further. This needs to be followed as it is potentially a very serious situation for Scotland and the North Sea. Thanks for the heads up on this OP.
Best to all those nearby this thing and prayers for safety.
DH

I hope this doesnt blow up (too soon?) It could be bad news if it does. And if the pipes are owned by BP, and BP had a Well utterly fail because of bad pipes, shouldnt we check all these pipes or at least replace them? They obviously suck and are cheaply made.

Another example of BP's greed, negligence or nefarious agenda.
More links here.
www.stabroeknews.com...
Hmmm, used to jack up the prices again?
af.reuters.com...

gcaptain.com...

That's a lot of bubbling
If this blows or continues to leak, how will it effect the ice shelf?
I'm sure there will be a few here that will say there is nothing to worry about, stop the fear mongering, and this is all normal.

reply to post by DavidsHope


Thank you, that was a great recap..

Sounds to me like they need to shoot an RPG at this thing....

But seriously, temperatures are already abnormally high. The smallest extreme heat, flame, or spark sets these gas clouds off. I'm guessing they have a plan to deal with it before summer? Or before this gas spreads and gets mixed up in some sea breeze and damages marine over a larger area...

This thread needs to be bumped. Much better than the racism fest I was involved in last night!

“If gas is leaking directly from well casing below the mud line, the best recovery option will probably be to drill a relief well to intersect the problem at a point well below the leak. The relief well can then be used to kill the well,” an engineer familiar with the matter said.

“This option is likely to take several months and cost a lot of money. In the meantime a lot of gas may potentially get released into the atmosphere,” he added.

source

Several MONTHS??? DAMN we have raped this planet inside and out....

I can't believe this, is it BP again? They are deliberately poisoning and destroying the ocean??? We have to stop this once and for all! And find the purse behind them. Pull out the buried technology clean it all up and put them in jail.

Sine, reverse HZ frequency purifies water.

reply to post by My.mind.is.mine


You are welcome OP: I fully agree with you. This is a very toxic type of gas as well, and I thought perhaps I would clarify more about ownership of this rig and pipes.
The Rig is owned by Shell. The pipes that transfer the gas to the mainland are owned by BP .. it is not a BP rig.
If the BP pipes are compromised that would be the case but this is bubbling right under the rig so most likely it is a Shell problem. And let us do hope this thing does not blow. That it doesn't worsen.
The prevailing winds and wind direction could be a problem . I have not looked at that. Weather is not my forte. Perhaps someone could take a look at the location of this thing and check prevailing winds? But at 150 miles it would probably dissipate?
BP only owns the pipes shell owns the rig
www.rigzone.com...
DH

reply to post by Unity_99


It is shell
The transfer pipes that go to the mainland are BP this is a shell problem..
www.rigzone.com...

reply to post by Violater1


The rig is Shell. The Gas is transferred through BP pipes
www.rigzone.com...

great

don't you just wish you could apologize for the human race's stupidity to the earth someitmes ?

Well is this yet another megadisaster in the making

As far as I can tell, we have shortened the interval between these events over the last few decades, and the next step is to have more than one simultaneously occurring.

If we keep having these "oops" and "boo-boos' at this accelerating rate...I'm not sure we'll have another generation before a variety of factors cause it all to come crashing down!

Shortages on top of megadisasters, on top of climate change. Sheesh, we will have no breaks any time soon!

They'll need to go in with a sub... that's probably their best shot at closing up the leak without risking explosion.

At least, that is what I would do.

~Namaste

www.total.com...

the "inferno" deep in the Earth

Elgin/Franklin, an exceptional development in the U.K. sector of the North Sea, arose from the successive discoveries of two deeply-buried offshore fields, Franklin in 1986 and Elgin in 1991. This pair of neighboring reservoirs deep in the Earth lie more than five kilometers below the seabed, where the pressure reaches 1,100 bar - equivalent to balancing over one metric ton on a thumbnail - and the temperature, 190°C. Never before had the oil industry attempted to develop high-pressure/high-temperature (HP/HT) reservoirs on this scale. And when our E&P teams decided to tackle this gigantic challenge in 1997, many of the technologies had yet to be invented. But with the support of intensive R&D spurred by the Elgin discovery, they managed to achieve their objective in 2001. It was an amazing feat, culminating in the successful bringing on stream of the world's biggest HP/HT field.

en.wikipedia.org...

The Elgin–Franklin fields are two adjacent gas fields located in the Central Graben Area of the North Sea 240 kilometres (150 mi) east of Aberdeen, Scotland at the water depth of 93 metres (305 ft). The field operated by Total S.A. shows record values in terms of temperature and pressure, with 197 °C (387 °F) and 1,155 bars (115,500 kPa)
Produced oil is transported through the Forties pipeline system to Kinneil in Fife while produced gas is transported through the SEAL Pipeline to Bacton, Norfolk.

GE Oil and Gas | Source
source.theengineer.co.uk/ge-oil-and-gas/25331.supplier
GE Oil and Gas has been selected by Total EandP UK to supply drilling and production equipment for the expansion of the Elgin Franklin gas field in the North ...

GDF Suez sells stake in Elgin-Franklin fields - MarketWatch
www.marketwatch.com/.../gdf-suez-sells-stake-in-elgin-franklin-field...
28 Sep 2011 - FR) said Wednesday it has signed an agreement with Italian oil company Eni (ENI.MI) for the sale of its 10.4% stake in the Elgin-Franklin gas condensates fields ...

UK's Elgin Franklin oil, gas field resuming output

LONDON | Fri Oct 7, 2011 5:19pm BST

Oct 7 (Reuters) - Britain's Elgin-Franklin oil and gas field in the North Sea is ramping up production following an unplanned outage on Thursday, a spokesman from operator Total said on Friday.

"Elgin-Franklin is ramping back up to normal production levels at present," he said, without disclosing how long the ramp-up will take or pre-outage flow rates from the field.

It went down on Thursday due to a minor technical fault, he said. Gas production ground to a complete halt, but some oil was still flowing during the downtime period.

Elgin Franklin feeds into Britain's Bacton SEAL.

The North Sea Elgin Franklin field can produce up to 15.5 million cubic meters/day of gas, according to Total's website. (Reporting by Oleg Vukmanovic, editing by Jane Baird)

Total acquires GDF Suez interest in Elgin/Franklin - Offshore
www.offshore-mag.com/articles/2011/12/total-acquires-gdf.html
6 Dec 2011 - If the effective date of the transfer is before the end of this year, as expected, ownership of Elgin/Franklin will be Elgin Franklin Oil & Gas (100% Total) at 46.2%, ...

f

Intervention fluids using cesium formate

Cesium formate brine is a heavy low-viscosity clear fluid, purpose-designed to provide the oil industry with a better and safer well control fluid for HPHT well interventions. Its unique hydrothermal chemistry ensures its stability and durability over long periods in HPHT wells.

Furthermore, cesium formate brine protects common viscosifiers and fluid loss control additives against thermal degradation – allowing the formulation of very effective well kill pills that can control fluid loss for several days under HPHT conditions. Some operators routinely have cesium formate-based kill pills ready on a stand-by basis at the rig site.

Cesium formate brine is a powerful suppressant of gas hydrate formation and can be used in pills to melt hydrate plugs (e.g. as used in Elgin/Franklin wells).

To date cesium formate brines have been used as well intervention and suspension

Wireline equipment
Cesium formate is ideal for challenging well interventions
fluids in around 20 challenging HPHT wells and have demonstrated the following advantages over traditional high-density intervention fluids:

Reduced formation damage – cesium formate is essentially incapable of causing permanent formation damage. Most users report that after a few weeks of production their well productivity indices exceed expectations after exposure to cesium formate brine during well interventions.

New improved HSE standards and reduced liability – no other high-density brines come close to matching

Two of my family work for big oil, oddly enough in the sfety side of things, i have sent out an email to see if i can get any better info on this... dunno though, one works worldwide and the other has done lots of work in the northsea... so i'll see!

I didnt know anything about this and it must only be about 400 miles from my doorstep!

reply to post by GonzoSinister

Does the North seas get lightning strikes in the spring, summer? Wouldn't a rig be a lightning magnet?

Originally posted by My.mind.is.mine
reply to post by DavidsHope

 

Thank you, that was a great recap..

Sounds to me like they need to shoot an RPG at this thing....

But seriously, temperatures are already abnormally high. The smallest extreme heat, flame, or spark sets these gas clouds off. I'm guessing they have a plan to deal with it before summer? Or before this gas spreads and gets mixed up in some sea breeze and damages marine over a larger area...

This thread needs to be bumped. Much better than the racism fest I was involved in last night!

edit on 26-3-2012 by My.mind.is.mine because: (no reason given)

Dude you are too much, an RPG is just what is needed here !!

And the "racism fest" was fed alot by yourself...anyways we need more humor, and more action, like CLOSING DOWN these bloody things...or getting some dam accountability.