Recently, in cooperation with COSCOL and DNVGL, the field measurement team of the State Key Laboratory of Ocean Engineering of Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU) has completed two filed monitoring projects for the dynamic positioning floatover installations in Malaysian waters. After having completed seven domestic offshore installations and measurement projects, the SJTU measurement team has, for the first time, stepped out of China and got an international project through bidding.

Offshore installations and measurement are difficult for the following reasons: First, to achieve accurate navigation and positioning on the sea, we need not only advanced GPS satellite navigation system, but also accurate and reliable on-site mapping data. Secondly, the calibration and verification are difficult to be conducted for offshore installment and measurement projects, and mistakes are hard to be corrected. To meet up with such strict requirements for the projects, the SJTU measurement team explored and innovated on-spot mapping techniques of floats, which guarantees the effectiveness of mapping plans. Thus, local coordinate system was established at the sea, offshore jacket and topside module were mapped accurately, the conversion of local coordinates and world coordinates, and the offshore demarcation with system accurate were achieved. On this basis, SJTU measurement team innovated and created independently the installment of floats in guide systems of ships, module separation and monitoring system, and the general platform to monitor the offshore environment, and finally achieved its pre-set objectives. The SJTU measurement team owns entirely the proprietary intellectual property rights of these achievements, some of which are the “firsts” in the world.

The success of the two field measurement projects provided important supports for the installations of the billion-dollar platform, and wins SJTU high evaluations from many domestic and international professionals such as PETRONAS, HHI, COSCOL, DNV GL and ADPS. This marks that the offshore actual measurement techniques of SJTU have reached a very high level internationally.

By TIAN Na