Lifting efficiencies through equipment
20 FEBRUARY 2015
With the oil and gas industry currently facing challenges, efforts towards greater operational efficiency is high on everyone’s agenda.
Furthermore, as the UK Continental Shelf (UKCS) continues to mature, investors face new challenges as production becomes more expensive and difficult due to some offshore assets now exceeding their design life at more than 30 years old.
The increased challenges have meant that businesses are now heavily focused on cutting costs and requesting equipment that offers efficiency and increased productivity to save downtime.
Innovation for efficiency
As a firm that specialises in the manufacture and rental of a range of marine equipment for the global energy industry, including high capacity winches, umbilical deployment and specialised subsea lifting equipment, it has been one of our main objectives to provide the industry with equipment that is innovative, safe and efficient.
To demonstrate our long-term commitment to the oil and gas industry, over the last two years, we have invested more than £3.5million pounds in our rental fleet, focusing on the design, manufacture and operational elements of our range ensuring it is easy to use and maintain which helps to increase safety and reduce risk of injury – a major requirement for the whole industry.
This investment has enabled our in-house research and development team to make accurate and efficient improvements to our equipment working closely with certification authorities.
Our equipment, which includes lifting winches, subsea winches, spooling winches, marine cranes, umbilical deployment systems, HPUs and other associated equipment, has been specifically designed and developed using market research, carefully selected materials and established methods to create an innovative fleet that allows for easier management of assets.
As such, we can now provide the industry with a new generation of equipment that is safe, sustainable and efficient in any offshore environment and certified by DNV GL – a recognised stamp of approval to offer clients further guarantees of efficiency and thus increases in productivity.
Safety first
Advances in the industry have propelled safety to the forefront and as a manufacturing firm; we have ensured that safety is a priority throughout the whole organisation, especially in our product development.
With an in-house design and manufacturing department, we have been able to ensure quality and control is maintained throughout and we have taken care to ensure the critical dimensions of our equipment offers an element of standardisation so it can be easily deployed to any location and to any team, which avoids hampering their productivity or ability to carry out their role.
We have also been focused on looking for safer ways of completing tasks by developing and improving existing technology, without over engineering and using standard/off the shelf raw materials and components during the design stages.
Rigorous testing has played a vital part in our design cycle to ensure compliance with industry standards. Testing also provides further reassurance that products are user friendly and importantly, safe to carry out tasks competently.
Future of lifting equipment
Customer requirements are changing with demand for increased reliability and safety features, specifically within the lifting sector as new guidelines and regulations are introduced to protect those working with lifting equipment.
As an employer, it is your duty to provide equipment that is safe and in compliance with statutory requirements. Accordingly, as part of our product development, we think it is important to work with both clients and operators at the design stage to get input and feedback on key elements. This has allowed us to design and develop a range of innovative equipment that is tailored to suit their specific needs, transportable and suitable for harsh marine environments.
As the industry continues to advance, companies continue to seek more efficient ways of working to reduce operating costs and ensure projects are executed safely. As a business, we have placed more emphasis on client engagement to expand the rental range, focusing on their changing requirements. For example, we have recently invested in several new high capacity marine cranes to assist rigging operations offshore as more clients become less reliant on vessel or platform cranes.
Undoubtedly, the focus on efficiency has significantly increased as firms work hard to combat the falling oil prices. However with safety in mind, it is important to use the challenging times to push the boundaries and drive innovative ways of working and equipment to the forefront.
Dave Acton, Chief Operating Officer @ Motive Offshore Group