The new Arctic frontier presents substantial opportunities for oil and gas developments over the coming decades. The Arctic is also one of the most pristine environments left on our planet. DNV has a unique position and a corporate vision to work in partnership with the industry to ensure safe and sustainable developments within this iconic region.

The potentially vast natural resources of the Arctic are balanced with the specific and quite extreme challenges of this unique environment. It is unarguable that, with the planet warming and the sea ice retreating, the world is increasingly focusing on the sustainability of the cold climate regions. The oil and gas industry’s interference with and damage to this area will be construed in a particularly high profile and detrimental light. In the new ‘risk reality’ of the Arctic, the industry will have to prove a ‘no failure future’.
As oil and gas activities move to the High North, interaction with seasonal and permanent ice cover becomes unavoidable. From a structural viewpoint, the loads imposed by the pack ice or drift ice may be the dominant load condition, especially in regions where multi-year ice, thicker and often stronger than first-year ice, is present. The ice load may govern the structural form, particularly the requirement for continuous icebreaker assistance for floating structures. From an operational viewpoint, the installation and construction season is very short and can in some areas be limited to as little as 2–3 months between ice melt and formation.

Managing harsh risks
Rational schedule risk management is essential for accurate field development, which in turn requires accurate environmental forecasting of the region’s ice conditions. Re-supply and logistics are also complicated in the presence of a permanent ice cover, and icebreaker assistance may be required. If the field development plan utilises tankers rather than a dedicated pipeline, the ice-handling capacity of the tanker needs to be assessed and the slower speed of transit out of the ice considered.

The Arctic environment presents a particularly difficult working environment for personnel. Extreme cold and the polar night are challenging to work in. This environment complicates common approaches to emergency escape and rescue; launching conventional lifeboats on a permanent ice cover is not productive and, if not planned, the evacuation of personnel into the harsh Arctic weather could be just as dangerous as the situation the personnel were escaping from.

For the assessment of ice actions on ships, structures and pipelines, the characterisation of the dominant ice regime is a critical facet in the design process. Sea ice is a naturally occurring geo-material which is principally solid but is perhaps more adequately described as a porous or granular material. Sea ice exists close to its phase change temperature and as such is highly susceptible to local temperature variations. Ice strength is highly linked to the temperature and mechanical history during the formation and consolidation of the ice. Mechanically deformed ice, in the form of ridges, can act to greatly increase the effective thickness of the ice cover – with a substantial impact upon transit and operational loads.

The identification of rational characteristic ice features for floating and subsea design options requires greater resolution, as practical experience of these facilities in High North regions is limited. Conventional statistical techniques, used to generate deterministic, semi-probabilistic or fully probabilistic assessments of the ice regime, result in a high degree of uncertainty. Handling this uncertainty is one of the critical issues when moving into the High North regions.

Joint efforts to ensure safe operations
Joint Industry Projects (JIPs) are one of the most effective means of achieving safe and sustainable developments in the Arctic regions can be achieved. The JIP vehicle allows complementary experience and knowledge sharing between researchers, operators and service contractors. There is a great deal of activity in this sector, looking at a range of issues from specific equipment winterization to material response at low temperatures and human operator competencies and training requirements.

Arctic offshore structures: A key focus of JIP activity is the development of new codes of practice for Arctic Operations and Technology. The recognised ISO 19906 ‘Petroleum and natural gas industries – Arctic offshore structures’ standard represents a concerted effort by operators, designers, researchers and service contractors to present the current state of the art for accepted design principles and approaches to the design of Arctic Offshore Structures. Supporting this standard is a JIP aimed at producing a new Recommended Practice (RP), DNV-RP-C209. The RP will provide practical and consistent design recommendations for fixed and floating structures in ice. It will provide guidance where existing codes are incomplete, silent or merely provide functional requirements.

Arctic offshore pipelines: The existing design code structure does not provide implicit or explicit guidance for the design and operation of Arctic pipelines. Project-specific design approaches and knowledge retention by key contractors are currently the norm. There is a wide variation in the accepted design principles and probabilistic approaches currently employed to determind and deal with the threats to Arctic pipelines. The focus of this JIP is on describing methodologies for qualifying assessment tools and in generating rational characteristic values to describe the governing ice regime during the lifetime of the pipeline system. Particular attention is being paid to ice gouging and optimised pipeline burial depth, where assessment methodologies and tools are very much at the cutting edge of technological development.

Marine icing: Marine icing presents a large potential threat to the stability of vessels operating in cold climate regions due to ice accretion on the superstructure. The new MAR-ICE JIP aims to provide predictive tools for and mitigation measures to combat atmospheric and sea spray icing for oil- and gas-related marine activities in the High North.

Marine operations: Marine operations in ice-covered waters present significant challenges, not only to the structural response of the vessel but also to the crew’s capacity to react to a dynamic loading situation. Maritime simulators are becoming an increasingly prominent method for planning drilling and construction activities in order to optimise ice breaker assistance. Several projects are currently underway or the pipeline to develop standards of competence and certify maritime learning programmes. A recent standard publication on ‘Competence of Officers for Navigation in Ice’ is highlighted.

Improving technology can assist in managing the risk to Arctic operations.
A prime example of this is the development of a new system to monitor actual ice loads acting on the ship hull and display ‘utilization’ factors to the bridge. Improving procedures for operating in Arctic regions is arguably equally as important, such as a the JIP examining new procedures for ship-to-ship transfer of liquefied natural gas in open waters – a topic which is particularly relevant for the potential transport of LNG produced in Northern Russia to Western markets via the Barents Sea.

Shared challenges solved with shared development
The challenges to the development of safe and sustainable oil and gas activities in the High North are legion; however, the list of innovative projects to meet the challenges of the new Arctic frontier is equally as impressive. Joint Industry Projects offer a practical vehicle for the optimised development of the tools that industry needs to deliver safe and cost-optimised projects in the High North. Such JIPs cannot hope to address all the challenges in one succinct package but, when examined together, they present defined solutions to an increasing number of the new challenges this exciting frontier presents.