"cazzyodo" (cazzyodo)
12/19/2013 at 09:22 • Filed to: Boatlopnik, HOLY CRAP
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"cazzyodo" (cazzyodo)
12/19/2013 at 09:22 • Filed to: Boatlopnik, HOLY CRAP | 0
| 8 |
A coworker !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! with the text "kinda cool." Indeed.
Meet the "Prelude", owned by Shell Oil. As it is owned by Shell you would imagine that this ship has something to do with fuel. Your imagination serves you correctly as this ship is going to be a sort of natural gas rig. It will be anchored off the coast of Australia and is a fully functioning harvester and processor of natural gas. Some quick Google-fu gives me !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! but for those who want the overview I've pulled some facts below.
- Cost about $11 billion...yes...$11 BILLION DOLLARS
- 1,601 feet long...that's over a quarter mile and 150 feet longer than the Empire State Building is tall (including the spire)
- 243 feet wide...as the video in the first link states, wider than the Panama Canal (shows how important that section of the world is to this ship)
- weighs over 600,000 tons fully laden
- it will be anchored for 25 years
- it is reportedly able to withstand a category 5 hurricane
- an estimated 3.6 million tons of liquefied natural gas is expected to be produced each year
- the on-board storage tanks hold the equivalent of 175 Olympic swimming pools of product (one pool is approximately 660,000 gallons/2,500 cubic meters of volume)
- some reports say there are three engines on board but Shell's introduction video (which is like a minute long info-graph) says it does not and is actually moved around using tugs
There we have it. There's more info out there (like how it launched from South Korea), I'm sure. The scale of this thing is absurd but I am really interested in how it actually functions. A tour inside would take a long time but a highlight reel on "How it's made" or something of the sort would be nice.
Enjoy!
Update: !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! Mentions 3 separate 6,700 hp thrusters that help realign the ship during storms and docking of other ships. I would imagine the sheer size of this vessel made long-distance transport a job for tugs. Thanks for the comments bringing me to this train of thought.
MontegoMan562 is a Capri RS Owner
> cazzyodo
12/19/2013 at 09:26 |
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Moved around by tugs? How many?! 3000 of them!?
Here's the start of the fleet:
FJ80WaitinForaLSV8
> cazzyodo
12/19/2013 at 09:32 |
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I'm sure it has engines on board, but they are used for energy generation and liquefying the natural gas instead of propulsion.
OtherBarry
> FJ80WaitinForaLSV8
12/19/2013 at 09:41 |
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You are correct. They are going to be compressor engines for liquifaction.
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cazzyodo
> FJ80WaitinForaLSV8
12/19/2013 at 09:49 |
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Guess I should have said for propulsion!
Though, I am inclined to believe that there are methods for propulsion that do not require a dozen other ships...
Jayhawk Jake
> cazzyodo
12/19/2013 at 09:53 |
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I'm sorta surprised something like this isn't more common.
It's doing the job of a traditional 'brick and mortar' type building, but it's better in quite a few ways
You can bring the product directly to it rather than having to use multiple vehicles to get from the source to a processing plant
It can be moved in the event of a storm/change in resources
It wouldn't be terribly hard to upgrade the internals
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cazzyodo
> Jayhawk Jake
12/19/2013 at 09:55 |
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Shell's article on it also points out that it takes up less space than a traditional facility on land. They are kind of forced into being more efficient or conscious of different factors.
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FJ80WaitinForaLSV8
> cazzyodo
12/19/2013 at 10:01 |
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I really doubt it has its own means of propulsion. Propulsion is sort of an all or nothing proposition and you can clearly see in the time lapse that it doesn't have screws on the stern.
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cazzyodo
> FJ80WaitinForaLSV8
12/19/2013 at 10:10 |
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Turns out it has "thrusters" more stationary adjustments. Kinda cool when it comes down to it.