Baker Hughes adds sophisticated well stimulation vessel

One of the world’s largest well stimulation vessels, the 300 ft Blue Tarpon, was delivered  to Baker Hughes, Houston, Tex., earlier this month by North American Shipbuilding, Larose, La.

Baker Hughes selected naval architectural firm Elliott Bay Design Group, Seattle, Wash., to provide the owner’s design for the vessel and integrate the company’s stimulation equipment.

“The Blue Tarpon is designed to provide operators with redundancy on all key elements of the stimulation plant,” says Derek Mathieson, president of products and technology for Baker Hughes. “Enhanced safety systems, as well as redundant back-up blending and pumping capabilities, have been installed to reduce the risks associated with performing multizone, high-rate, high-pressure completions. The ship also was designed with a focus on reliability and efficiency, allowing operators to minimize delays and associated operating expenses in high-cost offshore environments,” he notes.

The vessel provides high-rate and high-volume stimulation treatments for demanding offshore operations.  The Blue Tarpon offers fracturing, sand control, acidizing, and pressure pumping operations with three blenders.  And, with one of the largest proppant and fluid carrying capacities in the world, the vessel can perform complex, multiple-zone completions without traveling back to port for resupply.

The seventh vessel in the Baker Hughes fleet, the Blue Tarpon is ABS classed. The vessel provides operators with redundancy on all key elements of the stimulation plant and incorporates enhanced safety systems, as well as redundant back-up blending and pumping capabilities which have been installed to reduce the risks associated with performing multizone, high-rate, high-pressure completions.  The ship also was designed with a focus on reliability and efficiency, allowing operators to minimize delays and associated operating expenses in high-cost offshore environments.

The Blue Tarpon has a maximum pump rate of 80 barrels per minute, proppant capacity of 2.1 million pounds below deck, 750,000 pounds above deck and accommodations for up to 44 people.  It is designed to perform round-the-clock operations in deepwater plays.  The vessel’s 10 separate high-pressure pump units—housed in a fully enclosed structure to protect the equipment from the environment—can deliver up to 24,000 hydraulic horsepower and pump up to 32,000 pounds of proppant per minute.  The Blue Tarpon also features a DP-2 dynamic positioning system with twin bow thrusters and a stern thruster specifically designed to operate safely in the widest possible weather and sea conditions.

June 30, 2011