Throughout our company’s history we have been involved in a range of special projects and the shutdown in the Norwegian Continental Shelf is a great example. The major concentrations of H2S made our service a necessary precaution.
Our Client in Norway had scheduled a shutdown to repair and upgrade 6 valves in the oil bearing storage cells, positioned at the bottom of the platform, 200 meters beneath the water level and classified as Zone 1: A place in which an explosive atmosphere, consisting of air mixed with dangerous substances in the form of gas, is likely to occur.
It was a known fact that high concentrations of H2S would be found in the ballast water and our expertise was a necessary precaution to prevent incidents related to the release of toxic gasses, especially the deadly concentrations of H2S was a concern.
A part of this project was to empty the content from the storage cells and ship a tanker to load the volume. During this transportation we measured H2S concentrations above 5,000 ppm. Putting this into perspective H2S becomes deadly already at 1000 ppm.
To make sure that any gas leak was detected and all involved personnel were protected throughout this project we had 6 supervisors onboard the installation working day and night, together with our detection and protection equipment. In this project our service was a life saving measure.
