ELITE Precast Concrete’s Legato interlocking blocks are said to have shown their ’versatility and durability’ after been called upon to help with the health and safety of people and infrastructure when decommissioning North Sea oil rigs.
With hundreds of wells being decommissioned every year and more oil and gas fields shutting down, operators are expected to spend approximately £24 billion on decommissioning between 2023 and 2032. Stakeholders are looking for long-term solutions that will leave the marine environment clean for use afterwards, are compliant with essential standards, and will keep people, infrastructure and the surrounding area safe while work is being carried out.
So, when Kishorn Port Limited (KPL), a joint venture between Leiths (Scotland) Ltd and Ferguson Transport (Spean Bridge) Ltd began the retiring of North Sea oil rigs at the Kishorn Yard in Strathcarron, the aim was to create as safe an environment as possible to do so. Kishorn Yard is unique in its geography, with an ’almost unlimited’ water depth just off the port in the Sound of Raasay and an 80m deep channel in Loch Kishorn with 100m-plus deep sheltered berths in the Sound of Raasay.
With the dry dock being the largest in Europe with a 160m diameter with 13.8m of water at MHWS, equipment can be trialled in safe, low risk conditions within the dry dock, even in the harshest of winter conditions.
As part of the dry dock area, Elite Precast manufactured 1,300 Legato concrete blocks that were delivered by Elite’s delivery partner, Shropshire Express Deliveries (SED) and installed to hold the decommissioned oil rigs for demolishing, recycling and disposal of the platform in dry dock.
With oil platforms weighing up to 11,500 tonnes, stakeholders determined the safest methodologies possible and opted for using Legato blocks as part of the plan.
Owen Batham, sales and marketing director for Elite Precast, said, “Our haulage partner, SED successfully delivered the blocks during the winter, facing snow and heavy rainfall. This project just shows the range of applications that Legato blocks can be used for, and the trust stakeholders hold in Elite.”
