Aiming at Deep Sea, Shandong Draws A Blueprint for the Great Ocean

By Liu Zhiliang

Ocean Engineering Equipment Stands Out

Over recent years, Shandong Province has seized the opportunity of the State building an ocean power to step up scientific and technological innovation in ocean engineering equipment field,and by building “Shandong Model”featuring “industry, university, research and user” collaborative innovation, and enabled Shandong ocean engineering industry to realize leapfrog development.Localization rate has increased, and a number of advanced enterprises with strong international competitiveness in the ocean engineering equipment field represented by CIMC Raffles, COOEC and PJOE Offshore Engineering Heavy Industries Co., Ltd. Have emerged,substantially improving quality and level of the Shandong ocean engineering industry development.

As the Chinese saying goes,“A fast train is driven by a powerful locomotive.”If development of an industry is led by a leading enterprise, CIMC Raffles is the engine of development of the Shandong ocean engineering industry, in terms of technical content of products and advanced extent alike. Among the first batch of seven “Offshore Engineering Manufacturers White List” identified by MIIT, CIMC Raffles ranks first.From the first drilling platform“COSLPIONEER” delivered in 2010 after 50 months or 11 million man-hours to the same-type platform delivered in 2014 as a result of 28 months or 6.4 million man-hours,CIMC Raffles design and construction capacity achieved a qualitative leap step by step. As of now, China has delivered 11 deepwater semisubmersible drilling platforms to global clients, CIMC Raffles has delivered 9, accounting for more than 80%, and truly elbowing itself into the global first echelon for the deepwater ocean engineering equipment field.

In 2017, CIMC Raffles built“Blue Whale 1” super deep water semi-submersible drilling platform,successively completed the task of participating in the national sea area gas hydrate pilot production and broke the world record for continuous gas production time and total gas production, enjoying high reputation in the world. “Blue Whale 1”created many world first -- the largest drilling depth of 15250m, largest operation water depth of 3658m, weight exceeding 40,000t, 117m long, 92.7m wide, 118m high, both volume and capacity ranking world first. Moreover,its integrated equipment complexity can also be called world first, 27354 pieces of equipment, more than 40,000 pipes,more than 50,000 quality completion inspection application points, cable stretch length of 1.2 million meters,equal to the distance from Beijing to Shanghai, able to operate safely in Grade 12 typhoon. “Blue Whale 1”demonstrated the strength of “power treasure”, and helped China take the lead by making corner overtaking in the deep and high sea core equipment field.

In the ninth State-level new district launched with approval of the central government -- Qingdao West Coast New District, ocean engineering equipment industry has become a new card, COOEC is obviously a strong performer. On May 16, 2018, world largest tonnage FPSO P67 with CNOOC as EPC contractor was successfully delivered at COOEC. This was the outbound FPSO project with the largest quantities, most complicated and highest technical requirements in China. P67 displacement reached 350,000t, equal to 5-time “Liaoning”aircraft carrier. The deck is densely covered with seventeen functional modules, gross ton is more than 25,000 tons, the largest single module topped 2700 tons. The 82m-high torch tower erection tested CNOOC altitude operation and safety and risk prevention and control capability.

Furthermore, COOEC completed LNG core process module building project -- Amazon project. Located in Russian extremely cold region of the Mal Peninsula, it is one of global largest LNG plant construction projects and also global first polar natural gas prospecting and development, LPG,transport and selling integrated project.Core process module project equal to heart of the hole LNG plant has a gross weight of about 180,000t, 270,000 linear meters of pipeline was laid, 3.3 million meters of cables were laid,COOEC comprehensively completed the construction task of 36 core process modules, not only becoming global first contractor who delivers LNG module product as scheduled and with guaranteed quality, but also broke the record of world single site single-project safety record.

In Shandong, PJOE Offshore Engineering Heavy Industries Co., Ltd.and Penglai Zhongbai Jinglu Shipbuilding Co Ltd with distinct features in the ocean engineering field have emerged, not only realizing cluster breakthrough of the offshore engineering equipment industry,but also leading the world in some segmentation sectors.

Fill Ocean Gaps

China has increasingly stepped up development and utilization of deepsea resources and energy over recent years with its pace of building an ocean power, in addition to mineral and oil/gas resources, deepsea fishery has also become a development focus. In such circumstances, while maintaining the traditional offshore engineering advantages, offshore engineering enterprises give full play to technological and experience accumulation in offshore engineering equipment blazed its own trail in deepsea and high sea fishery equipment R&D and manufacturing.

As another shiny card in CIMC Raffles “conversion of old and new kinetic energy” and CIMC Raffles has made a continuous effort in deepsea fishery equipment. On the domestic market, more than 20 marine ranching platform and deepwater net cages designed and manufactured by CIMC Raffles are projected to erect on the coast of Shandong Province in May 2018,assisting the provincial ocean fishery to lead the national industry, leading the national sixth ocean fishery wave. On the international market, CIMC Raffles and Norwegian Ocean Aquafarms AS signed a letter of intent on manufacturing of 5 Hex Box aquaculture cages and received Norwegian Nordlask global largest and most advanced Nordlaks Havfarm 1 deep-water aquaculture working ship order. We learn that CIMC Raffles will ally European enterprises to jointly develop and manufacture deepsea platforms applicable to Chinese sea area, smart large net cages and aquaculture working ships among other ocean fishery equipment, build sea ranch demonstration area and establish itself as a priority project for “Shandong Old and New Kinetic Energy Conversion Major Project” .

Qingdao Wuchang Shipbuilding also aimed at deepsea fishery equipment market opportunity, took the initiative and made significant gains in domestic and overseas markets. In June of 2018,China’s first batch 3 super-large fishery aquaculture equipment for South China Sea “Haian Lingshui Deep and High Sea Aquaculture Platform”undertaken by Wuchang Shipbuilding for Hainan Province kicked off on Qingdao base, and this is global first tropical “deepsea smart fishery”.The Platform will first started tropical sea area deep and high sea large net cage aquaculture, one-time input size is the largest (primary water input hits 750,000m3), will realize world first super-large aquaculture equipment cluster cultivation, and will open a new era for China deep and high sea ocean fishery aquaculture. Previously,Qingdao Wuchang Shipbuilding had successfully delivered world first semisubmersible large smart aquaculture platform “Ocean Fishery 1” and China’s first independently developed large all-submersible deep-sea fishery breeding equipment “Deep Blue 1”.

The deepsea aquaculture equipment delivered by Shandong shipbuilding enterprises filled world offshore engineering research and construction voids, laid solid foundation for development of large maritime aquaculture equipment industry with China independent IPR, boosting development of China offshore engineering industry.★