Large electric motors for oil platforms
Classified as hazardous areas, offshore oil rigs require equipment that is designed and certified accordingly, this includes electric motors to drive critical gas compressors.
Zest WEG regional sales manager West African region Foster Yeboah says that WEG electric motors for these applications comply with IEC standards and associated hazardous area specifications, which certify equipment for use in ‘explosive atmospheres’.
Six large WEG motors are being installed on an oil platform off the coast of Ghana. Considering the hazardous marine environment, all the WEG machines were supplied with tough epoxy paint and conformed to an IP65 rating. Four of the new motors are large 9 500 kW, WEG MGW800 machines, and two are 7 000 kW MGW710 machines. With weights of up to 23 t, the electric motors exceeded the 19 t weight limit of the oil platform’s crane, so the motors were shipped to site in component form, for assembly on site.
“These six WEG motors are upgrades of previously installed WEG motors, which have been operating successfully on this site for over a decade,” says Yeboah.
“Of course, the factory acceptance test is always vital, so this has to be conducted on all the motors after they are manufactured and tested,” he said.
Zest WEG technicians assemble the electric motors on the oil platform, including the various electrical and hydraulic connections and piping. Commissioning and testing are done before the system goes online. The large WEG motors in this application are cooled using the IC81W air-water cooling principle. Air is circulated through the motor base where the rotor and stator generate the most heat. A heat exchanger then extracts the heat from the internal circuit air flowing through it.
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