Maersk Oil and DHI are these days celebrating the 30th anniversary of the launch of a metocean (wind, waves and currents) monitoring programme for a majority of the Danish North Sea oil and gas producing platforms.
The comprehensive programme was initiated in 1981 and started up just in time to carry out measurements of wave heights during the severe hurricane on November 24th 1981. Starting out with measurements solely at the Gorm field center, the system has been significantly enlarged and improved over the years, and is now a fully online system with a number of different water and weather sensor types collecting data from nine oil and gas fields in the central part of the North Sea.
Tyra East platform during a storm in November 2007. © Maersk OilThe data has been used for calibration and validation of atmospheric and oceanographic models and thereby improved the metocean data used for operation and maintenance of existing installations and design of new infrastructures in the Danish North Sea sector.
DHI has through all the years been contracted by Maersk Oil to operate, maintain and upgrade the system. DHI has carried out this job combining skills and knowledge from its experienced field survey group with our metocean specialists and engineers. The direct access to data and insight into the instrumentation has given DHI a unique opportunity to provide state-of-the-art metocean consulting services throughout the years.