Reliance-BP ‘bubble’ delivers two deep water gas fields despite massive Covid-19 challenge

| | New Delhi
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Reliance-BP ‘bubble’ delivers two deep water gas fields despite massive Covid-19 challenge

Monday, 24 May 2021 | PTI | New Delhi

Just four months in a year are available for construction in Bay of Bengal. Even that window got complicated with constantly changing restrictions on movement of people and material across the globe because of the pandemic.

But work bubbles for over 4,000 persons at peak of the project alongside navigating restrictions to source material and people globally helped deliver two deep sea gas fields. Since 2017, Reliance Industries Ltd along with its JV Partner bp had embarked on concurrent development of three deepwater fields in the Krishna Godavari basin block, KG-D6, to monetise 3 trillion cubic feet of resources with an overall capital investment of `35,000 crore.

But the outbreak of pandemic early last year disrupted global supply chains and impaired movement of personnel who are essential for executing a complex project that involved installing equipment and pipelines in water depths of almost 2 km.

 An RIL official said that to execute these complex deepwater projects, teams have been working across 34 countries and at peak more than 4,000 persons were deployed offshore and onshore.

 Those working on the project were organised into cohorts that interacted only with each other to minimise contact with outside people. Cohorts were organised on the principles that work bubbles should include the least number of people required to do the job and strictly separated from other bubbles in time and/or space to prevent virus transmission between groups.

 Also, this involved navigating through different and constantly changing restrictions on movement of people and material across the globe, the official said adding the narrow four month in a year offshore construction and installation window on the east coast of India added to these challenges.

“Despite the unprecedented challenge, the joint venture successfully commissioned two out of the three deepwater fields: R Cluster field - India’s first ultra-deepwater gas field and Asia’s deepest offshore gas field, in December 2020 and Satellite Cluster in April this year,” .

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