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 Sustainability Strategy Commitments
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UKOOA Sustainability Strategy 2002 - First Report
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4. Stewardship - Making Prudent use of Natural Resources
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4.4 End Of Operations Legacy
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Commitment No. 58 - Pipelines and cables
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Along with the existing projects examining drill cuttings and decommissioning in which key stakeholder groups are involved, and in accordance with the framework set out in the new DTI Decommissioning Guidelines, we will also assess the most appropriate long-term solution for seabed pipelines and cables.
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Progress to date : achievements and difficulties encountered
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The offshore oil and gas industry supports the case by case position taken in the DTI Decommissioning Guidelines (see www.og.dti.gov.uk) that decisions [on the decommissioning of pipelines] will be taken in the light of individual circumstances: all feasible decommissioning options should be considered and a comparative assessment made. Industry will take the most beneficial option in every case, following an appropriately detailed assessment using techniques and criteria acceptable to government and wider stakeholder interests.
The fishing industry has an interest in the state of the seabed and potential hazards to fishing. During 2001 UKOOA worked with the fishing industry to address the issue of free spans those lengths of pipeline where the supporting seabed has been washed away. This would also be one of the issues to consider at time of decommissioning.
Given that pipelines have a long lifetime (possibly several hundred years), a longer term issue to consider is the potential for part of the existing network of pipelines to act as a future resource, such as for the transport of CO2 for underground sequestration (see Commitment No.47 GHGs).
Cables come into the same category as pipelines as far as decommissioning is concerned. The offshore oil and gas industry has relatively few cables on the seabed (control cables and some electricity power cables) in comparison to the telecommunications industry.
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Website References
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Sustainability Strategy Commitments
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