Laying carbon dioxide pipeline

Skandi Navica is currently laying the pipeline which will allow carbon dioxide separated from Snøhvit production to be injected back into a separate formation on the Barents Sea field.

This pipeline runs out to the storage structure, which lies beneath the gas-bearing layers on the Statoil-operated field, from the Melkøya receiving terminal in northern Norway.

Statoil has been separating carbon dioxide from its Sleipner West gas production and storing these volumes in a sub-surface formation in the North Sea since 1996.

Such injection and storage is set to reduce total carbon emissions from the two fields by no less than 1.7 million tonnes per year, including 700,000 from Snøhvit.

Statoil is also involved in the carbon deposition project for the In Salah gas field in Algeria.

The group’s work on carbon deposition is unique, and has been closely followed by the media, research bodies and governments worldwide since the Sleipner West project began.

“Our Snøhvit pipeline marks the first offshore injection of carbon dioxide from a land-based plant,” says Jorunn Klovning, manager of health, safety and the environment for the Tromsø Patch/Snøhvit.

Injection of carbon dioxide beneath the seabed will substantially reduce the environmental burden at the Melkøya plant, she points out.

“At the same time, we’re winning valuable experience which will be highly significant for continued development of carbon deposition in future projects.”

Work on laying the eight-inch injection pipeline began from land in early June, and just over half of the 151-kilometre length has so far been installed.

The pipeline is being reeled onto the seabed from a drum on Skandi Navica, a method which provides a laying speed of 10-20 kilometres per day. This is scheduled for completion in the course of July.