Statoil : The first Johan Sverdrup topside installed

Ståle Nordal, Statoil's project manager for the riser platform, is very pleased to see the platform fully assembled at the Johan Sverdrup field. The construction has been a success in terms of time, cost and quality, but also in terms of safety. All in all, the construction has taken about 7 million hours, and with zero serious incidents.

The key to success, according to Nordal, is thorough preparations and learning from other projects built in South Korea, as well as a supplier fully committed from day one in Samsung Heavy Industries.
'Delivering a topside of this size and complexity in less than 20 months, and without a single serious incident, is a feat on its own,' says Nordal.

Busy installation campaign
The installation of the riser platform marks the beginning of one of the most hectic installation programs ever for a project in Statoil. More than 400 km of pipelines, 200 km of power cables, the drilling platform, two jackets and a bridge, will be installed during the next weeks and months.

And in early May the offshore organization, which will grow to as many as 2,400 people spread across three shifts at its peak, will initiate the important work of connecting and hooking up the growing field center and starting to prepare for production start-up late in 2019.

'With this milestone we firmly take a step into the final phase of the project. These operations have been carefully planned, drawing on Statoil's significant experience in this area. Even so, given the significant installation scope in the Johan Sverdrup project we're entering into an exciting but complex period, with safety always as the highest priority. With the riser platform in place, however, we have taken a significant step forward in preparation for start-up late next year,' says Digre.