Focus on excellence

Technological prowess is the cornerstone of BPs growth strategy and nowhere is this more visible than in the implementation of its major projects. Bruce McMichael talks to the people leading some of the companys multi-billion dollar operations. As bulldozers moved in to start work on the 1,609 kilometre (1,000 mile) Baku-TbilisiCeyhan (BTC) pipeline, ink was still drying on hundreds of contracts containing more than 17,000 signatures from country presidents and environmental groups to village leaders along the route as it snakes through some of the worlds most remote, politically complex, but spectacular countryside.
Further east, in China, BPs secret X Technology is being applied in some of the worlds most advanced petrochemical plants producing purified terephthalic acid (PTA), the feedstock chemical for polyester and plastic bottles. Over in the Gulf of Mexico engineering record books are being rewritten as fields such as Holstein, Mad Dog and Thunder Horse come on stream, already industry legends. Major projects like these enthuse men like BPs director of projects Graham Cattell. He sees them as the way for the group to grow organically and maintain our position as a leading energy supermajor. Were looking to grow by turning ideas into projects. Tony Meggs, BPs vice president for technology, agrees; BP is a technology driven company and almost everything we do is based on technological prowess and understanding. By late 2004 BP was implementing 19 major projects defining major as involving investment of more than $500 million at a total expenditure of nearly $55 billion. By 2008 projects such as Train 5 at Australias North West Shelf, Kovytka Gas in Russia and the Puma and Tubular Bells fields in the Gulf of Mexico could become as familiar as Holstein and Algerias In Salah are now. But reeling off a catalogue of names and numbers however striking, cannot begin to describe the triumph of human effort in turning ideas into multi-billion dollar projects and, ultimately, revenue and shareholder value. Already the largest single foreign investor in Trinidad & Tobago, BP is the largest investor in the Atlantic LNG joint venture, along with partners BP Group, Repsol, Tractebel and National Gas Company of Trinidad and Tobago. Gordon Ramjattan, president of BP Trinidad & Tobago, explains that the joint venture operates three trains, with a fourth due on stream in early 2006 with a 5.2 million tonnes per year (tpy) production capacity. This is a significant increase from the 3.2m tpy throughput of the previous trains which has been achieved by scaling-up the three-cycle process using eight advanced gas turbine drivers per train. Working closely with the government, BP sowed the seeds for the islands first fabrication facility that will deliver the unmanned Cannonball platform for the eponymous development.
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Focus on excellence

Cannonball will have two of the highest-producing wells ever drilled in the Caribbean which together would provide sufficient raw gas to feed an LNG train. We incorporated a number of exciting, innovative engineering solutions into the project, says Ramjattan. Each well can produce 350-400 million cubic feet of gas per day, sufficient to satisfy half the needs of an LNG train. Weve also used microturbines, on board multiphase metering and, for the first time, can pump corrosion inhibitors directly from the service boats into the platform and then into the well string. Traditionally project management skills have been learnt through experience and an occasional course. However, as the first cadres of graduates from the BPs Project Academy, run in partnership with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, feed ideas into their regular work, it is clear that project management across the group has changed forever, says Jim Breson, Projects Academy director. A BP employee for over 24 years Adrian Clark, performance unit leader for the Holstein development in the Gulf of Mexico, is enthused when discussing this project of exceptional achievement. The millions of decisions, engineering calculations, adjustments and even welded joints are now standing up to intense scrutiny as the oil flows through the first of perhaps 15 production wells, he states. Holstein consists of a truss Spar, loaded with facilities capable of handling production and drilling operations simultaneously. Clark, an early graduate of the Project Academy, remembers Holsteins first oil with a passion: December 9, 2004. We had a magnificent start-up. Five hours after first oil flowed through, BP was exporting the oil. Holstein is the worlds largest truss Spar production platform and is likely to retain its record beating title as it pushes the laws of physics to the limit, says Clark. Floating in 4,300 feet (1,324 metres) of water, Holstein is anchored to the seafloor by 16 chain, wire and suction pile anchors, supporting topsides weighing over 26,445 tonnes. The list of innovations and achievements developed by the Holstein team is brimming with an impressive number of firsts; the first Spar supported by a vertical riser system, the use of feathered heave plates and access shafts and the highest capacity and largest suction anchors ever constructed. The integration of a permanent drilling rig on the Spar design suits the very thin, stacked sands in the reservoirs unlike those found in the deeper reaches of the Gulf. Well placement is therefore critical and the Spar offers continuous access to these wells for re-entry to reach side pockets in the sands. At peak production, the facility will produce more than 110,000 barrels of oil and 150 million standard cubic feet of gas per day. Holstein is one of several BP deepwater developments scheduled for start-up in the Gulf over the next two years. Others developments include Thunder Horse, Atlantis and Mad Dog, where production started in January.

Focus on excellence

Floating 1,300 metres (4,265 feet) above the seafloor Mad Dog is the first offshore development in the deep waters of the Gulf to use synthetic polyester moorings for anchoring. Sourced from the UK, the 26,500-kilometres (16,466-miles) of ropes have a breaking strain of 1,932 tonnes. Lighter than traditional steel wire ropes, the polyester ropes drastically reduce vertical loads on the Spar hull. Pumping out Thunder Horses oil at pressures of over 1,200 bar and 135oC forced engineers to develop hundreds of new technologies, listed as Serial Number Ones (SNOs) including an incredible 32 major components in a 140 millimetre (5.5 inch) diameter completions string 18 of which were classed as SNOs, the first of their kind ever made. Similar innovation and attention to detail can be witnessed in the Caspian Region. Ten years after signing the production sharing agreement for the Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli oil field (ACG), famously known as the Contract of the Century, is fast approaching a significant milestone with first oil from Central Azeri forecast for early 2005. Neil Shaw, performance unit leader for ACG Project, comments: ACG has been a project of enormous scope and scale where we have had to overcome some significant and unusual challenges. First we had to build the infrastructure to develop the project with new fabrication yards, upgraded pipelay and lift vessels. We also had to recruit and train a workforce of over 10,000. We take these things for granted elsewhere in the world. As the Caspian is landlocked, we have had to move over 500,000 tonnes of materials through the Russian canal system which has been one of the biggest logistical exercises ever undertaken. The project has been like a moonshot and the Eagle has landed. Petrochemicals feature heavily for BP in China, the worlds fastest growing economy, says Jim Moore, BPs head of projects, petrochemicals. At the heart of BPs leadership of the worldwide PTA industry is X Technology, a proprietary process now found in BP plants in China and Taiwan. PTA is the favoured raw material in polyethylene terephthalate, a vital ingredient for manufacturing textiles, packaging and film products and is a multi-billion dollar global industry. In the early 1990s, managers, realising that there was a danger that BP could lose its market-leading position to rivals, invested heavily in Project X which has since revolutionised PTA production, says Moore. An international research team based in Naperville identified key processes in need of revitalising, focussing on the initial oxidation and purification stages with the focus to deliver huge capital cost savings when building new production facilities, says Moore. X technology cuts down capital investment on a single plant by up to 25%, offering huge cost savings by squeezing the environmental footprint by building smaller scale facilities.

Focus on excellence

Chinas rapid industrial growth in hotspots such as Zhuhai in Guangdong province has meant increased pressure on local ecosystems, less of a problem for X technology which recycles all water, equivalent to eliminating around four tonnes of waste water per tonne of produced PTA, says Moore. Meanwhile, Jean-Marc Soucy, BPs vice president assets, US Convenience Operations and another Projects Academy graduate, is charged with spending up to $400 million this year alone installing and refurbishing new filling stations across the country, a tremendously important task in terms of developing BPs image across the worlds largest gasoline and convenience food market. Soucys team is rebranding heritage Amoco sites with a helios makeover whilst handling dozens of real estate projects. They are planning new BP Connect stations from Orlando and the Bronx in New York to the Rockies, where the heritage Arco stations are being renovated to include new signage to denote the linkage to BP but, due to high customer recognition and loyalty, are not being rebranded. Described as gas stations of the future, they feature a futuristic look, a deli-caf with fresh baked foods, Internet access, and the use of solar panels to reduce energy consumption. Each new site costs around $3m to install but through an innovative procurement and construction agreements with construction company Bovis Lend Lease (BBL), known as the Global Alliance, huge savings are already in the pipeline. Stations are constructed as modules and bolted together on site, says Soucy. The units are built offsite allowing us to cut onsite installation costs, ensuring that all sites have the same branding and identity that our customers expect. BPs many major developments around the world are growing in complexity. Developing large oil and gas fields in deep waters or remote areas, building export pipelines or networks or branding fuel stations requires significant capital expenditure and superior project management skills. With billion dollar budgets, managers are responsible for spending hundreds of thousands of dollars each day. As projects such as Holstein and ACG come on stream, its clear that technology remains the spiritual heart driving the groups future. Bruce McMichael is a journalist specialising in business, energy and the environment.

Focus on excellence

Article Captions Leading the way: BP is the largest foreign investor in the Atlantic LNG joint venture. Project overview: Far and second left, the BTC pipeline passes through three countries including Turkey and Georgia; above, the Holstein spa being towed to its destination in the Gulf of Mexico; below, the construction of the heli deck on the Central Azeri compression and water injection platform. Sign of the times: An Amoco retail site get a helios makeover. Project X marks the spot: Hillside view of the Zhuhai Plant in China.