TU890 With the gradual development of offshore oil and gas development to the deep sea and the far sea, the cost and risk of laying long-distance oil and gas return pipelines are getting higher and higher. The effective way to solve this problem is to build an offshore oil and gas processing plant – FPSO (Floating Production Storage and Offloading), which is a floating production storage and offloading device integrating production, oil storage and offloading. FPSO can provide export power for offshore oil and gas fields, receive and process the produced oil, gas and water mixture, after the treatment of crude oil stored in the hull, to reach a certain amount of export to the shuttle tanker.

Customers face pain points

TU890 A provider of measurement solutions and automation technologies for the oil and gas industry, offering a wide range of scalable process automation solutions that support cloud and edge computing. For FPSO operators, a higher level of process security is required to protect people, assets and the environment, while maintaining longer uptime and minimizing disruption. To this end, the company offers FPsos a broad portfolio of offshore products to meet FPSO customers’ requirements for cost, safety integrity levels and availability.

Among these solutions, the company faced some important challenges for the specific needs of key electrical connection technologies:
• Device and platform security

As a large device on an offshore platform, it is faced with a harsh TU890 Marine environment. Once the electrical failure of the system causes failure, it will seriously affect the safety of the equipment and platform. Therefore, in the selection of electrical connection products, it is necessary to take into account that the selected products meet a variety of stringent world-class certifications, and the stable reliability of safety, explosion protection, corrosion, electromagnetic compatibility and other requirements are extremely high.
• Space utilization

In the limited offshore operation platform, it can be said that “inch of land”, the company in the system TU890 installation, it is urgent to reduce the volume of electrical connection products as much as possible, under the same system function requirements, save more space for the electric cabinet, improve the overall space utilization of the electric cabinet.

• Wiring accuracy

TU890 As a system integration provider, the company was faced with a heavy workload and unsatisfactory accuracy in the early wiring, and wanted to improve this situation as soon as possible to save valuable engineering delivery time for the FPSO system.

Weidmuller electrical control system comprehensive solutions

In order to meet these challenges, the company chose to work with global industrial connectivity expert Weidmuller to create a comprehensive solution for the FPSO project that covers the power supply of the electrical control system, wiring and grid-connection.
•W series terminal

A wide range of Weidmuller electrical coupling products are optimized for the automation industry to meet the requirements of CE, UL, TUV,GL, CCC, Class I, Div. 2 and other stringent certifications, to ensure normal operation in all types of Marine environments, and to meet the industrial requirements of Ex TU890 explosion-proof certification and DNV classification society certification. For example, Weidmuller’s W series terminals use high-quality insulation Wemid, flame retardant grade V-0, no halogen phosphide, and a maximum operating temperature of 130°C.
• Switching power supply PROtop

Weidmuller’s products place great emphasis on compact design, through the use of compact switching power supplies, which are small in width, thin in size, can be installed side-by-side in the main control cabinet without a gap, and have a very low heat generation, and always provide a safe 24 V DC voltage for the control cabinet.

• Modular overload connector

Weidmuller offers modular heavy-duty connectors from 16 to 24 cores, all of which are error-proof coded in a rectangular structure and pre-installed for nearly a thousand connections required for the test bench. In addition, the heavy-duty connector takes advantage of the quick wiring method of screw connection, and the test installation can be completed only by inserting the connector on the test site.

Customer benefits

With Weidmuller switching power supplies, terminals and heavy-duty connectors, the company gained the following value:
• Meet stringent certification requirements such as DNV classification Society

It provides efficient and stable power supply capacity for the main control system of FPSO, so that the electrical circuit has a good short circuit and overload resistance, can be 120% continuous overload or 300% instantaneous peak overload capacity, and can still ensure safe operation within the limit value. This meets the stringent certification requirements of offshore platforms such as DNV classification Society.
• Save panel installation space and load bearing requirements

Weidmuller PROtop power supply products are only 124mm thick, thin and easy to install, and by using Weidmuller’s heavy-duty connectors, compared to traditional products, the size can be reduced by more than 50%, the weight is reduced by more than 65%, greatly saving panel installation space and load-bearing requirements. Secondly, modular HDC products can provide different types of module sizes with a single interface, greatly reducing space requirements and costs.
• Reduce labor costs and wiring error rates

Weidmuller’s heavy-duty connector adopts the rapid connection method of direct connector, which greatly saves the cost of wiring labor time while improving the installation efficiency of the equipment, and also reduces the wiring error rate, avoiding a series of unforeseen losses and the impact of work efficiency caused by on-site misconnection. In addition, the screw installation connection method reduces the customer’s workload by 50%.

At present, the digital transformation of the oil industry is bringing great impetus to oil and gas exploration, development and production. By partnering with this industry-leading customer, Weidmuller’s deep experience and leading solutions in the field of electrical connectivity and automation help customers create safe, stable and intelligent FPSO oil and gas production platforms in a more efficient way.