An Analytical Study of Controlled Buoyancy in Laying Deep-Sea Pipelines

Abstract

The application of active and passive buoyance control as an aid to deep marine pipelines has been quantitatively investigated. The use of buoys yields a substantial reduction of barge thrust and pipe tension. A systematic method is used to calculate buoy forces from a desired stress distribution. An efficient numerical solution procedure has been developed for predicting static marine pipeline geometries during laying operations. The iterative procedure is well suited for solving the two-point boundary value problem over a wide range of ocean depths.