Local dynamic buckling of FPSO steel catenary riser by coupled time-domain simulations

Abstract

Steel catenary riser (SCR) is a popular/economical solution for the oil/gas production in deep and ultra-deep water. The behavioral characteristics of SCR have a high correlation with the motion of floating production facility at its survival and operational environments. When large motions of surface floaters occur, such as FPSO in 100-yr storm case, they can cause unacceptable negative tension on SCR near TDZ (touch down zone) and the corresponding elastic deflection can be large due to local dynamic buckling. The generation, propagation, and decay of the elastic wave are also affected by SCR and seabed soil interaction effects. The temporary local dynamic buckling vanishes with the recovery of tension on SCR with the upheaval motion of surface floater. Unlike larger-scale, an-order-of-magnitude longer period global buckling driven by heat and pressure variations in subsea pipelines, the sub-critical local dynamic buckling of SCR is motion-driven and short cycled, which, however, can lead to permanent structural damage when the resulting stress is greatly amplified beyond the elastic limit. The phenomenon is extensively investigated in this paper by using the vessel-mooring-riser coupled dynamic analysis program. It is found that the moment of large downward heave motion at the farthest-horizontal-offset position is the most dangerous for the local dynamic buckling.