Conventional energy resources
Services in the area natural resource commodities
Oil, gas, and other natural resource commodities like sand and (rare) minerals are often found in remote locations that are difficult to access, environmentally sensitive, and feature unfriendly climate conditions. Witteveen+Bos has developed into a specialist for accessing these areas – especially where land meets water – and unlocking the valuable commodities located there.
With its renowned Dutch engineering expertise on reclaiming land from water and protecting it from the elements with dykes and polders, Witteveen+Bos supports the extraction industry by opening up these locations and reshaping the surrounding area to accommodate the required operations and minimise impact on both the environment and society. All our projects fall within the scope of the energy sector's ‘Net Zero by 2050’ roadmap (IEA).
We provide the following types of design support:
- Land reclamation and artificial islands
- Marine logistics and emergency response bases (ports)
- Marine access and navigation channels (dredging and nautical designs)
- Emergency pipeline repair strategies (focusing on accessibility)
- Landfalls, safe burial depth, and self-burial pipelines
- (Waste)water treatment facilities
- (Water) transport pipelines and pumping stations
- Flood and ice protection structures
- Causeways, breakwaters, and other hydraulic structures
- Heavy haulage transport roads for oversized, heavy modules, and other roads
- Tailing site facilities (dam, ponds, site drainage, and waste/tailings management)
The resulting designs are supported by a variety of studies, including:
- Wave and current modelling to identify extreme up and down surges in the area
- Turbidity analyses to support fish damage calculations
- Sedimentation assessment to predict maintenance dredging volumes in channels and port basins
- Ice loads and events to assess availability of channel systems (uptime) and forces acting on structures
- Remaining functional lifespan (structural integrity) and mitigating measures to extend this with minimum effort
- (Strategic) water management studies (within and outside fence) to assess potential for water footprint reduction (water stewardship)
- (4D) groundwater flow modelling and analysis to understand and manage environmental impact and stability of structures
- Seismic (dynamic) analysis (for projects in seismic active regions)
The best example of all this expertise being brought together is formed by the oilfields in and around the shallow North Caspian Sea, where temperatures range from 40 degrees Celsius in the summer to -40 in the winter. Causing the sea to completely freeze.
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