COMPOSITE PRODUCTION RISER - TESTING AND QUALIFICATION

The production riser is a tension leg platform (TLP) component that le nds itself to taking advantage of the unique properties of advanced co mposite materials. A composite production riser (CPR) has the potentia l to reduce capital expenditure and improve reliability for developmen t of reservoirs in deep water because of its lighter weight, improved corrosion resistance, and excellent fatigue per performance compared w ith steel risers. In 1995, a project was organized by several oil, ser vice, and composite manufacturing companies and partially sponsored by the U.S. Dept. of Commerce Natl. Inst. of Standards and Technology Ad vanced Technology program to develop a cost effective CPR for deepwate r applications and to overcome the technical challenges in design, ana lysis, fabrication, and qualification of a CPR. A critical element of this project is the specification and implementation of a comprehensiv e testing program to confirm the advantages, validate the design, and establish the long-term performance of a CPR as well as to secure the confidence of both operational staff and certifying authorities. The t esting program was designed to identify performance Limitations, estab lish the failure envelope for the full-diameter CPR joints, and verify that the manufactured CPR meets the performance requirements for appl ication on a TLP in the Gulf of Mexico. In addition, the resting progr am, combined with the analytical effort, was planned to establish stat istical variations in strength factors and to generate data to design CPR's of different sizes and for different operating conditions. This will allow for site-specific qualification of a CPR with minimal testi ng. In this paper, we discuss the testing program, review its rational e, and present currently available results. Test results clearly illus trate that current state-of-practice for design and manufacturing of c omposite CPR joints are well advanced to achieve the required cost eff ectiveness and high reliability for use in deepwater developments.