Giant ship begins new North Sea oil and gas era

[hunter]

One of the world's biggest ships has begun a new era for the North Sea oil and gas industry.

The Pioneering Spirit, owned by Allseas, used its vast lifting capacity for the first time to remove a platform for scrappage.

It carried out the operation on Monday, and is taking the platform to a Norwegian yard.

The ship's first lift was in the Norwegian sector of the North Sea.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-scotland-business-37161319

"New era" apparently means cleaning up the old projects while building new larger scale projects, such as the Johan Sverdrup field, scheduled to start producing in 2019:

Johan Sverdrup – generating gigantic value

Johan Sverdrup is one of the five biggest oil fields on the Norwegian continental shelf. With expected resources of between 1.7 – 3.0 billion barrels of oil equivalent, it will also be one of the most important industrial projects in Norway over the next 50 years. The development and operation of this enormous field will provide revenues and jobs for coming generations.

--more--

http://www.statoil.com/en/Johan-Sverdrup/Pages/Johan-Sverdrup-Field.aspx

Nope, nothing to worry about here... Surely wind turbines will put them out of business.

[Thinkingabout]

1. Wow, this is a giant ship, engineers are capable of delivering a design to place a city on the water

[Auggie]

2. If they build it they will use it

Oil will be with us until we choke to death from its pollution