SAL - The Basic Concept

The central elements of the SAL system are a mooring and an oil flow line swivel with a single mooring line and a flexible riser for fluid transfer attached, anchored at the sea bed by the use of a single anchor.

This anchor also acts as the PLEM for the bottom export flow line. The SAL riser is designed for connection to either a standard shuttle tanker bow loading system or to a standard trading tanker. The tanker is hooked up to the system by pulling the mooring line and the riser together from the sea bed and up to the bow of the vessel. Here the mooring line is secured and the riser is connected to the bow loading system.

Following this operation the tanker can freely weather wane without the aid of propulsion. Disconnection is performed by lowering the mooring line and the riser down to the sea bed.

A SAL system consists of a single anchor on the seabed with equipment for mooring of and oil transfer to shuttle tankers. Vessels serving the field will upon arrival be moored to the SAL system by means of a mooring hawser with a connected loading hose.

Common for the APL systems is the principle of the vessel being able to weather vane freely when moored. For the SAL system this is solved by a combined mooring and fluid swivel located directly on top of the anchor. When the vessel aligns with the wind and current forces, this will impose a rotation of this combined swivel system. SAL is anchoring the vessel rotating around one singe anchor in the contrary to traditional mooring systems with a turret in the vessel moored to 8 to 12 anchors.

SAL/SAP References