Potential impact

Contribution to standards

The maintenance of floating offshore structures is subject to rules issued by the classification societies. The inspections rely on simple visual and magnetic particle inspection as laid down by the American Petroleum Institute in their document API RP 2FPS. ChainTest although conducting visual inspection, but in a more reliable manner, will open up new inspection capabilities. It will also introduce new ACFM and ultrasonic NDT methods.

The International Organisation for Standardisation has a committee (TC111/SC1) working on Chains and chain slings, including a working group (WG 1) on 'Test methods for chain toughness':

• Also Lloyds rules
• API RP2SK
• DnV POSMOOR
• API RP 2FS
• DnV requires annual surveys, intermediate surveys and a major inspection every 5 years.
• Inspection during retrieval. Should compare with previous inspections. Bent links, missing or loose studs.
• Major inspection: split chains at connecting links, MPI, dimensional checks over 5 links

ChainTest is therefore likely to have a profound effect on mooring system inspection and may lead to changes in recommended working practices. Procedures may therefore have to be standardised and included in classification rules.

ChainTest will only apply to annual structural surveys. However more progressive platform owners and operators may wish to utilise ChainTest in intermediate surveys, so that the trend in damage can be established as part of a predictive maintenance strategy, which reduces costs by permitting the replacement of mooring lines to be planned more efficiently.

The results of this project will be submitted to all interested parties with a view to promoting appropriate best industry practice. One of the RTDs, TWI, already has a track record of working with classification societies and influencing their standards.

Improvement of Small to Medium Enterprise (SME) competitiveness

Market overview

The conclusions of 4 major market studies by management consultancy companies and academics state that the automated and robotic inspection market is expected to experience growth rates exceeding 15% per annum for the next 5 years. The growth in automated NDT equipment and services is due to the fact that manual NDT has shown to miss major defects as recent PANI trials sponsored by the UK HSE has proven.

The results of the project will improve the competitiveness of the SMEs by diversifying their product portfolios to include the ChainTest system or components thereof. This will enable the SMEs to increase their share of the offshore inspection market since ChainTest system will have an important differential advantage over competitive products, which are currently based on manual NDT. The project will provide products of increased reliability and quality and, also, increased functionality.

Sector overview

There are many drivers for the drastic increase in the requirements for automated inspection of offshore structures including an increase in EC legislation for ensuring safety of maritime structures and vessels, and an increase in EC legislation for ensuring the safety of offshore workers has also contributed to the growth in the automated/robotic inspection requirements. The ageing of North Sea oil production assets has posed special concerns and they have placed increasing inspection requirements. Finally the cost of environmental clean up and insurance losses have meant that insurers have placed an increasing requirement on inspection.

The SME proposers have estimated that ChainTest inspection system will deliver sufficient competitive advantage to enable annual growth rates of at least 15% in their sales turnovers over the 4 years following project completion.

Strategic impact on partners and users of RTD results

Presently each of the SMEs has a significant market share in the current inspection and NDT market. As a result of participation in this project each SME expects to increase its market share in the 2 years following the project. They would expect their sales to rise at least 20% per annum in the offshore maintenance sector as the need for automated inspection is rising at 15% per annum. Realistically after the project the SMEs' market share will increase drastically as they will be able to provide an automated NDT inspection system, which will replace manual or semi-automatic inspection tasks and increase the user's confidence in the inspection. Table 1 below shows conservative estimates of sales of ChainTest inspection system, associated NDT systems and service by partner SMEs after the project completion. Figure 1 derived Table 1, shows that the SMEs will re-coup the initial investment just before the end of year 2 after the completion of the project.

Table 1 shows the sales of systems and services by the partner SMEs (Thousands Euros) in the EU. Year 1 represents 1 year after project completion. The table and figure below show that cumulative profits made by the SMEs, 4 years after project completion lie at 22.6 million Euro (see row 10 in Table 1).

Fig.1. Re-coupment (Breakeven point) of initial investment by the partner SMEs & EU
	The analysis (in Table 4 and Figure3) indicates that project cost will be fully recovered just before Year 2 following project completion. The SME partners will earn a cumulative net profit of approx Euro 22.6 million, 4 years after project completion. This is shown in row 10 of Table 4, which shows cumulative profits minus (original research investment + commercialisation costs).

Table 1 Sales of systems and services (1000s of Euros)

RoW	SME responsible for sale	Year after project completion	Yr 1 No. sold	Yr 1 Price item	Yr 1 Total sales	Yr 1 Total profits	Yr 2 No. sold	Total profits	Yr 3 No. sold	Total profits	Yr 4 No. sold	Total profits
		Sale of ChainTest system and its sub-systems. KEuros
1	Miltech	ChainTest inspection system to offshore industry	5	400	2,000	1,000	10	2,000	25	5,000	50	10,000
2		Ultrasonic wheeled phased array system (all industries)	5	20	100	50	10	100	20	200	30	300
3	TSC	ACFM system (all industries)	10	5	50	25	20	50	40	100	50	125
4	Interlab	Vision system or control and visual inspection (all industries)	2	20	40	20	5	50	10	100	15	150
5	Miltech	Amphibious robot vehicle (all industries)	2	300	600	300	5	750	10	1,500	15	2,250
6	NES	Chain cleaning system	2	12	24	12	4	24	6	36	8	48
7	Bytest	Inspection service provision to offshore structure owners			200	100	300	150	500	250	700	350
8	TOTAL PROFITS PER YEAR					1,507		3,124		7,186		13,223
9	CUMULATIVE PROFITS					1,507		4,631		11,817		25,040
10	CUMULATIVE PROFITS minus (Original Research Investment + Commercialisation costs)					-893		2,231		9,417		22,640

Risk assessment

The consortium does not believe that the project poses any dangers or risks to the consortium members, end-users or the general public. None of the NDT techniques pose any health risks. In fact the development of the ChainTest system will dramatically reduce the risk to EU citizens, by automating a dangerous inspection procedure, and making the use of mooring chains more secure.

Direct applications, patents and benefits to SMEs

On completion of the project, there will be 7 main Patentable prototypes for exploitation which are also project deliverables:

1. Main Patentable item is a prototype ChainTest inspection system. This will be the complete ChainTest system for inspection of mooring chains while in-situ, without having to bring the chains on-shore. The system will be marinised.
2. Patentable marinised robot crawling vehicle. The vehicle will be capable of climbing along chains and wire cables carrying a variety payloads, above and below water.
3. Patentable multi-purpose high resolution robot scanner and control system. The robot scanner will carry the cleaning heads and NDT probes and will be designed to follow the surfaces of a chain link under video control.
4. Patentable cleaning system. A precision surface cleaning system for removing soils and coatings from specific areas of a complex shaped object, such as a chain.
5. Patentable vision system. The video camera will be used to control the robot scanner and gather information for the visual inspection, including the dimensions of each chain link.
6. Patentable ultrasonic array probe. A phased array sensor will be designed specifically for testing chain links, and will be housed within a 'wheel' made of ultrasonically conductive material to provide good coupling on rough curved surfaces.
7. Patentable shielded alternating current field measurement (ACFM) probe. An ACFM sensor will be developed for testing on tightly curved surfaces and into grooves between chain links.

All of the above prototypes are Patentable and the deliverables have applications in the offshore inspection market. Furthermore the ChainTest system will have applications on any structure with long chains or wire cables e.g. bridges.

A patent search was completed on the 10-09-04 to ensure that this project does not contravene any existing technologies.

Solving problems at the European level

The project contributes to EU policy by promoting innovation and the participation of 6 SMEs and 3 RTDs from across Europe. European social and economic cohesion will benefit through transfer of the technology to less technically advanced regions, assisted by the inclusion of Greece in the consortium. The offshore industry is supplementing the already dynamic Greek maritime industry and the technology will contribute to the total life-cycle management of ships as well as floating platforms.

The EU has taken the lead in imposing stricter surveillance of offshore structures to protect the marine environment. The project will provide a tool for assessing the structural integrity of mooring systems of floating oil and gas production platforms in the North Seas, therefore reducing the risk of catastrophic pollution due to platforms breaking loose from their moorings and rupturing an oil and gas well-head. Specifically, Directive 2000/60/EC established a framework for Community action in the field of leakage of oil.

Community Societal Objectives (quality of life, health, safety, working conditions, environment)

Quality of life, health and safety

Offshore platforms are extremely hazardous. Workers have to carry out tasks in the presence of highly explosive materials, heavy machinery and in constant high levels of noise. The autonomous vehicle will allow the inspection and NDT to be carried out remotely with control from an office or other protected location.

Visual inspection and manual NDT is extremely monotonous. The automated system will mean that the operator will achieve greater job satisfaction and ensures the inspection is fully effective. It is estimated that robotic inspection in the EU would replace 0.7 million hours per year of tedious, stressful work with a smaller number of rewarding hours. It would deliver more reliable inspection at the same time.

The operation of an automated system on chains in-situ will reduce the number of personnel needed to bring the chains on-board, clean chains and conduct the visual inspection and NDT. This is in-line with the drive to reduce the number of workers on offshore structures, thereby reducing the number of helicopter flights, which are hazardous.

By improving the monitoring of structural integrity of mooring systems, the project will help reduce the risk of disasters due to pollution from platforms that break free of the moorings. These disasters not only affect the lives of coastal communities but also of holiday-makers and travellers from throughout the community, therefore affecting Europe's self-image.

Employment

Europe's offshore industry is important for strategic purposes. As production moves to marginal fields in the North Sea, it will need to concentrate of floating production platforms. It can also export these and the 'high-tech' components and services to new offshore oil and gas fields. ChainTest will enhance these 'high-tech' services and pose excellent export potential. Export markets will include Brazil, West Africa and the Caspian Sea, where there is rapid development of offshore oil and gas fields.

Automatic NDT inspection is also a growing enabling industry, driven by the need for test reliability and the requirement for documentation and record keeping. The NDT sector has many SMEs, such as those in this consortium, and the sales projections for ChainTest are consistent with the growth of 5000 jobs in this sector within 4 years of project completion.

This project will lead to an improvement in the level of skills for European citizens, as it will implement robotic NDT technology of greater sophistication than the current technology, which is based on manual NDT. The project will develop and sustain EU expertise in robotics and NDT methods, particularly in versatile robots for underwater inspection. This will necessitate training for European researchers in robot control and in IT skills. Currently, there is shortage of IT skills in the EU and member states are investing heavily in this area. ChainTest will contribute towards this effort.

Preserving and/or enhancing the environment and natural resources

ChainTest will promote the use of floating offshore production platforms in place of massive fixed platforms. Because floating structures can be taken on-shore for dismantling, they will also eliminate the environmental problems posed by redundant fixed marine structures.

ChainTest will promote the use of new light-weight floating offshore structures for applications including wind and wave power stations and may even in the future include factories. The European continental shelf can therefore be protected from permanent environmental degradation, while providing essential renewable energy and space for economic activity.

By reducing the risk of mooring failures of oil production platforms, ChainTest will prevent catastrophic marine pollution. A ruptured flow-line from an oil well can be expected to pollute the environment on a scale of an order of magnitude greater than from an oil tanker ship. The recovery time of oiled coastal areas could be 50 years. Thus improved inspection of mooring chains will protect the environment from major pollution.

The transfer from manual to automated inspection methods introduced by ChainTest will mean that this mainly male occupation will also encourage women participation.