• International Journal of Naval Architecture and Ocean Engineering
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• v.5 no.2
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• pp.179-187
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• 2013

Floating production storage and offloading (FPSO) facilities are used at most of the offshore oil fields worldwide. FPSO usage is expected to grow as oil fields move to deeper water, thus requiring the reliability and stability of mooring wires and risers in extreme environmental conditions. Except for the case of predictable attack angles of external loadings, FPSO facilities with turret single point mooring (SPM) systems are in general use. There are two types of turret systems: permanent systems and disconnectable turret mooring systems. Extreme environment criteria for permanent moorings are usually based on a 100-year return period event. It is common to use two or three environments including the 100-year wave with associated wind and current, and the 100-year wind with associated waves and current. When fitted with a disconnectable turret mooring system, FPSOs can be used in areas where it is desirable to remove the production unit from the field temporarily to prevent exposure to extreme events such as cyclones or large icebergs. Static and dynamic mooring analyses were performed to evaluate the stability of a spider buoy after disconnection from a turret during cyclone environmental conditions.

• Ocean Systems Engineering
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.131-161
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• 2020

The objective of this study was to evaluate the downtime cost of side-by-side offloading operations in Malaysian waters. With the help of a numerical time domain tool, the structure and cable response of moored FPSO vessel was simulated for heading and beam sea-states under irregular waves. The weather downtime was assessed by comparing the response under operational wave condition with the pre defined industrial safe offloading criteria. Additionally, two cases of cable failure were simulated for each sea-state. The novel study on downtime cost was presented for three different location of Malaysia subcontinent for which the location specific wave scatter diagram facilitated to estimate the probability of occurrence of operational wave condition. It was concluded that an unpredictable increment in wave height by 0.5 m can significantly impact the production cost.

• Ocean Systems Engineering
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• v.3 no.4
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• pp.275-294
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• 2013

Side-by-side offloading operations are widely utilized in engineering practice. The hydrodynamic interactions between two vessels play a crucial role in safe operation. This study focuses on the coupled effects between two floating bodies positioned side-by-side as a shuttle tanker-FPSO (floating production, storage and offloading) system. Several wave directions with different side-by-side distances are studied in order to obtain the variation tendency of the horizontal hydrodynamic coefficients, motion responses and mean drift forces. It is obtained that the coupled hydrodynamics between two vessels is evidently distinguished from the single body case with shielding and exaggerating effects, especially for sway and yaw directions. The resonance frequency and the peak amplitude are closely related with side-by-side separation distance. In addition, the horizontal hydrodynamics of the shuttle tanker is more susceptible to coupled effects in beam waves. It is suggested to expand the gap distance reasonably in order to reduce the coupled drift forces effectively. Attention should also be paid to the second peaks caused by hydrodynamic coupling. Since the horizontal mean drift forces are the most mainly concerned forces to be counteracted in dynamic positioning (DP) system and mooring system, prudent prediction is beneficial in saving consumed power of DP system and reducing tension of mooring lines.

• Ocean Systems Engineering
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• v.2 no.3
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• pp.217-228
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• 2012

As the size of container ships continues to increase, not many existing harbors can host the super-container ship due to its increased draft and the corresponding dredging requires huge budget. In addition, the minimization of waiting and loading/offloading time is the most important factor in harbor competitiveness. In this regard, mobile-harbor concept has been developed in Korea to achieve much improved harbor capacity and efficiency. In developing the concept, one of the most important elements is the operability of crane between two or more floating bodies in side-by-side arrangement. The container ship is to be stationed through a hawser connection to an outside-harbor fixed-pile station with the depth allowing its large draft. The mobile harbors with smart cranes are berthed to the sides of its hull for loading/offloading containers and transportation. For successful operation, the relative motions between the two or more floating bodies with hawser/fender connections have to be within allowable range. Therefore, the reliable prediction of the relative motions of the multiple floating bodies with realistic mooring system is essential to find the best hull particulars, hawser/mooring/fender arrangement, and crane/docking-station design. Time-domain multi-hull-mooring coupled dynamic analysis program is used to assess the hydrodynamic interactions among the multiple floating bodies and the global performance of the system. Both collinear and non-collinear wind-wave-current environments are applied to the system. It is found that the non-collinear case can equally be functional in dynamics view compared to the collinear case but undesirable phenomena associated with vessel responses and hawser tensions can also happen at certain conditions, so more care needs to be taken.

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.253-259
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• 2016

This study demonstrates the result of mooring analysis for five spread-moored FPSOs having different length-to-breadth (L/B) ratios from 4.5–6.5. FPSOs are subjected to four metocean conditions, ones from the Gulf of Mexico (Hurricane/Loop current condition), West Africa, Nigeria, and Brazil Campos Basin, which are amongst the most typical offshore oil and gas fields. With change in design parameters of OBA (Outer bundle angle) and IBA (Inner bundle angle) combinations, a change in the line tension is demonstrated and the OBA-IBA combinations having the smallest line tension are presented for each L/B ratio and sea, respectively. This study is expected to influence the preliminary design layout of an FPSO spread-mooring system as a function of the L/B ratio and metocean conditions.

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.63-69
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• 2013

The mooring lines of a floating type offshore plant are known to show wide banded and bimodal responses. These phenomena come from a combination of low and high frequency random load components, which are derived from the drift-restoring motion characteristic and wind- sea, respectively. In this study, fatigue models were applied to predict the fatigue damage of mooring lines under those loads, and the result were compared. For this purpose, seven different fatigue damage prediction models were reviewed, including mathematical formula. A FPSO (floating, production, storage, and offloading) with a $4{\times}4$ spread catenary mooring system was selected as a numerical model, which was already installed at an offshore area of West Africa. Four load cases with different combinations of wave and wind spectra were considered, and the fatigue damage to each mooring line was estimated. The rain flow fatigue damage for the time process of the mooring tension response was compared with the results estimated by all the fatigue damage prediction models. The results showed that both Benasciutti-Tovo and JB models could most accurately predict wide banded bimodal fatigue damage to a mooring system.

• Ocean Systems Engineering
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• v.6 no.3
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• pp.265-287
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• 2016

The change of the global performance of a turret-moored FPSO (Floating Production Storage Offloading) with DP (Dynamic Positioning) control is simulated, analyzed, and compared for two different internal turret location cases; bow and midship. Both collinear and non-collinear 100-yr GOM (Gulf of Mexico) storm environments and three cases (mooring-only, with DP position control, with DP position+heading control) are considered. The horizontal trajectory, 6DOF (degree of freedom) motions, fairlead mooring and riser tension, and fuel consumptions are compared. The PID (Proportional-Integral-Derivative) controller based on LQR (linear quadratic regulator) theory and the thrust-allocation algorithm which is based on the penalty optimization theory are implemented in the fully-coupled time-domain hull-mooring-riser-DP simulation program. Both in collinear and non-collinear 100-yr WWC (wind-wave-current) environments, the advantage of mid-ship turret is demonstrated by the significant reduction in heave at the turret location due to the minimal coupling with pitch mode, which is beneficial to mooring and riser design. However, in the non-collinear WWC environment, the mid-turret case exhibits unfavorable weathervaning characteristics, which can be reduced by employing DP position and heading controls as demonstrated in the present case studies. The present study also reveals the plausible cause of the failure of mid-turret Gryphon Alpha FPSO in milder environment than its survival condition.

• Journal of the Society of Naval Architects of Korea
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• v.47 no.4
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• pp.580-588
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• 2010

OPB(out-of-plane bending)-induced failure of mooring chain was firstly addressed by CALM (catenary anchor leg mooring)-type offloading buoy, located approximately one mile away from the bow of the Girassol FPSO which was installed offshore area of Angola in September 2001. This study deals with verifying the load transfer mechanism between the first free chain link and connected two chain links inside the chain hawse. OPB moment to angle variation relationships are proposed by extensive parametric study where the used design variables are static friction coefficients, proof test loads, nominal tension forces, chain link diameters, chain link grades and chain link types. The stress ranges due to OPB moments are obtained using nonlinear FEAs (finite element analyses). Final stress ranges are derived considering ones from IPT (in-plane tension) forces. Also a formula for OPB fatigue assessment is briefly introduced.

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.51-61
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• 2018

In this study, the operability of an FLBT (floating LNG bunkering terminal) was evaluated experimentally. Model tests were conducted in the KRISO (Korea Research Institute of Ships and Ocean Engineering) ocean engineering basin. An FLBT, an LNG carrier, and two LNG bunkering shuttles were moored side by side with mooring ropes and fenders. Two white-noise wave cases, one irregular wave case, and various regular wave cases were generated. The relative local motions between each LNG loading arm and its corresponding manifold in the initial design configuration were calculated from measured 6-DOF motions at the center of gravity of each of the four vessels. Furthermore, the locations of the LNG loading arms and manifolds were varied to minimize the relative local motions.

• Ocean Systems Engineering
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• v.8 no.3
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• pp.247-279
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• 2018

This study aims to investigate the behavioral characteristics of the LWSCR (lazy-wave steel catenary riser) for a turret-moored FPSO (Floating Production Storage Offloading) by using fully-coupled hull-mooring-riser dynamic simulation program in time domain. In particular, the effects of initial geometric profile on the global performance and structural behavior are investigated in depth to have an insight for optimal design. In this regard, a systematic parametric study with varying the initial curvature of sag and arch bend and initial position of touch down point (TDP) is conducted for 100-yr wind-wave-current (WWC) hurricane condition. The FPSO motions, riser dynamics, constituent structural stress results, accumulated fatigue damage of the LWSCR are presented and analyzed to draw a general trend of the relationship between the LWSCR geometric parameters and the resulting dynamic/structural performance. According to this study, the initial curvature of the sag and arch bend plays an important role in absorbing transferred platform motions, while the position of TDP mainly affects the change of static-stress level.