Wood Group is proud to have delivered engineering support to the Subsea Well Response Project (SWRP), a joint industry project to further improve the prevention of, and response to, subsea well-control incidents. Contracted by Shell, on behalf of the SWRP team, Wood Group Kenny led the way and drew on the expertise of Wood Group Mustang and Wood Group PSN. The energy services company has been supporting the project since 2012, and will continue to do so until the end of 2014.

The true value of the £multi-million contract for Wood Group Kenny is the involvement in such an important industry project to improve subsea well control incident intervention capabilities, according to Wood Group Kenny CEO, Steve Wayman: “This is an important and unique project that we are very proud to support. Nine major oil companies have demonstrated their commitment to discover further technological advances, increase safety and minimise the environmental impact in the event of a serious subsea well control incident; it’s an honour for Wood Group to be involved in this very important industry project.”

Wood Group Kenny has delivered the engineering design of subsea equipment, design verification of well testing & topside equipment and development of Subsea Well Containment Guidelines for the further engineering study (FES) phase of the project. Parallel to this, Wood Group Mustang performed the design of the topsides process system as well as the surface equipment package management. Wood Group Mustang also assisted the SWRP with various aspects of HSE management including work to develop safety case deliverables and the ALARP (as low as reasonably practical) case with regards to risk.

Wood Group PSN, through its consultancy business Wood Group ODL, supported the SWRP by defining and mapping the subsea well containment guidelines, coordinating the technical development and review of these documents, and providing technical authoring and electronic publishing support.

The SWRP is a non-profit joint initiative between nine major oil and gas companies and was set up in 2011 on the recommendation of the International Association of Oil and Gas Producers (OGP). Following recent oil spill incidents, OGP created a dedicated Global Industry Response Group (GIRG), to examine and improve the industry’s capacity to prevent and respond to subsea well-control incidents. The SWRP is being led by GIRG and is one part of the industry’s efforts to take forward these recommendations.

Throughout the FES phase of the project, Wood Group Kenny has supported the SWRP team to develop and prove concepts that are outside normal operating modes. As such, the approach to these concepts requires consideration of the challenges and how they are best overcome. The equipment & well containment guidelines developed as a result will form the backbone of the well owner’s planning and response capability. As the process of independently procuring equipment moves forward, Wood Group Kenny will provide personnel to support this phase along with the engineering support required to deliver the completed solution.

Wood Group will continue to provide ‘know how’ of the system to enable operators to become familiar with containment equipment’s functional and logistical requirements. Wood Group Mustang CEO, Steve Knowles added: “The expertise available globally across Wood Group enables us to deliver the complete engineering support package on this vital industry project.”