In Bangladesh’s first maritime pipeline project, a multi-functional modular seabed trencher designed by a Chinese company recently completed 100 kilometres of pipeline construction, setting two world records in directional drilling and deep trenching, says an article published in ECNS.
Specializing in constructing oil
The state-owned China Petroleum Pipeline Engineering Co (CPP), which is a professional company specialising in the construction of oil and gas storage and transportation infrastructure under the China National Petroleum Corporation, developed the seabed trencher on its own.
According to CPP, the installation of the marine pipeline project in Bangladesh, one of the key projects under the Belt and Road Initiative, requires six directional drillings and a buried depth of 11 metres to avoid commercial and naval waterways, posing an unprecedented challenge in world marine engineering history.
Upgraded trenching machines
To deal with technical difficulties, CPP has carried out independent innovations and upgraded trenching machines to achieve a maximum digging depth of 11.9 meters, mastered the underwater millimeter-level docking technology of offshore single-point mooring and adopted the original technique that ensured a 100 percent success in one-time drilling.
After the project is put into operation, oil tankers above 100,000 DWT that cannot dock to unload oil at ports in Bangladesh, CPP said.
Agreement with CPP
According to the Xinhua News Agency, Bangladesh is not capable of handling large vessels carrying imported crude and finished oil due to low navigability of a key river channel and constrained facilities at the main seaport in Chittagong, so the project was launched as an important oil and gas storage and transportation project under the Belt and Road InitiativCP
Bangladesh and CPP signed an agreement in December 2016 for engineering, procurement, construction, and commissioning of a single point mooring with 220-kilometer-long double pipelines, including a 146-kilometer-long offshore pipeline and a 74-kilometer-long onshore pipeline to transport imported oil from the sea to a refinery in Chittagong district.
The facility is expected to have a 9 million tonne annual unloading capacity.
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Source: ECNS
