The majority of oil and gas production in Europe takes place offshore, with over 34,000 wells in European waters. Whilst major leaks such as Deepwater Horizon are rare, oil is continuously spilling from undetected leaks. For example, the MC20 platform in Louisiana is estimated to have leaked up to 1.4 million gallons of oil since 2004 while the UK’s Health and Safety Executive showed that in the North Sea, 30 of the 134 gas leaks were undetected and of the 42 major deepwater oil leaks 41 were not detected at all in 2015.
With 85% of the oil produced in Europe coming from offshore fields, legislation is urgently asking for robust mechanisms to detect leaks promptly (e.g. EU’s recent directive 2013/30/EU). Undetected leaks cause severe environmental damage to marine ecosystems, fisheries and aquaculture. If leaks can be detected earlier, they can be plugged faster to minimise environmental damage and return the well to full production.
Current detection technologies, including but not limited to visual inspection, passive and active sonars, fluorescence and methane detectors, suffer from a range of limitations such as high false positives, high cost, lack of continuous monitoring or safety risks, meaning monitoring is ineffective, expensive and time consuming. In fact, the US Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration found that existing detection equipment was the first to detect a leak in just 19,5% of incidents. The other 80% of the time leaks were discovered by residents, landowners or site employees of the oil companies usually days after the leak occurred.
To address this growing problem, Subsea Asset Location Technologies (SALT) have developed STREAM which is a durable, low-energy and cost-effective system to continuously monitor oil and gas leaks in deep ocean waters. Based on patented technology, STREAM uses the acoustic (sonar) measurements of clean and contaminated water to detect changes in water composition in real-time and at a fraction of the cost of current technologies. Our highly innovative sonar reflector overcomes the limitations of existing solutions by using simple, robust components that can be permanently installed, operate continually with no maintenance and determine water contamination accurately, eliminating false positives/negatives.
This main objective of this project is therefore to refine and commercialise STREAM into the most robust, real-time, early warning system to detect contaminants in seawater, protect the marine environment, and help oil and gas companies meet stricter regulation.
