Site Wire Frame

Inspired by What Is Offshore Decommissioning [Infographic] and Rigs to Reef: Transecting Borneo (Trailer) we’ve decided to make our site in a parallax scrolling website format. In the video trailer, it starts off with a zoomed out shot of the oil rig above water. As the video continues viewers are guided down the structure of the oil rig, thus giving a sense of immersion and exploration. Similarly, a section of the info graphic takes you down the structure of the oil rig as you scroll down, which also helps clearly illustrate the information they’re trying to convey with it. For our site we want it to have a similar effect. Specifically, like our inspirations, as the user scrolls down our site it takes them down the structure of an oil rig. This helps the user to instantly visualize what an offshore oil rig is and how marine life co-exists with oil rigs. Moreover, readers are able to grasp what the site is about upon first glance.

Site Contents

What is Rigs to Reefs?
Once an offshore oil rig stops producing oil at economic rates, the site is usually simply abandoned due to the cost and work it takes to decommission a platform. However, in USA, the Mineral Management Service requires operators to remove the rig within a year of stopped production. The concept of Rigs to Reefs was first explored in the late 1970s when they realized offshore platforms are artificial habitats. They notice that around these structure there is an increase in algae and invertebrate along with a significant increase in the numbers and species of fish. The ocean is a big empty place and animals tend to concentrate around objects. Invertebrates need things to latch onto and fish want to hide in nooks and crannies, or just be around anything with a little structure to it.
When an offshore rig is removed from the environment, it destroys the habitat that has been created and disrupts the organisms residing at the site. Moreover, explosive removals of rigs are estimated to kill over 800 fish. Fishermen, divers, and coastal states have been concerned with the removal of these structures heavily-populated with marine life. Therefore, as an alternative to total removal, Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement — an agency under the government of United States — BSEE, began to work with interested parties and coastal states to address these concerns, thus creating Rigs to Reefs where decommissioned oil rigs are converted into artificial reefs.

How are the artificial reefs made?
Three general methods are used for removing and “reefing” a retired structure: 1) tow-and-place, 2) topple-in-place, and 3) partial removal.

1. Tow-and-place involves severing the structure from the sea floor either using explosives or mechanical cutting techniques and then towing it to the selected reef for deployment.
2. Topple-in-place also detaches the structure from the seabed. The detached structure is then toppled onto its side.
3. Partial removal generally does not use explosives. The top portion of the structure is severed at a permitted navigational depth, typically 85 feet deep, and placed on the sea floor next to the base of the remaining structure.

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California Information:
In 1984 the National fishing enhancement act was created to offset overfishing and habitat degradation established by artificial reefs. The act requires that all artificial reefs be designed, constructed and sited according to existing laws and regulations.

Nation Artificial Reef Plan Criteria Guidelines
Biological Considerations

• Bottom Substrate – Avoid setting up reefs on pre existing ecosystems. The act considers current lifeforms at the reefs. Creating an artificial reef at the expense of an existing ecosystem would be counterproductive.
• Hydrography – wave height and hydrological elements for example, water depth and current strength has to be considered. Artificial reefs in clear or shallow water that experience good light penetration have demonstrated higher levels of productivity (NARP 2007).
• Water quality – Factors such as turbidity, oxygen content and oxygen demand, water temperature, and nutrient loads and pollution all affect the potential success of artificial reefs.

Construction Considerations
Approve or deny materials for reef construction rests with the Artificial reef plan and existing federal regulations All approved materials should be inspected to ensure they meet the following requirements; they must be environmentally safe, structurally and physically stable, practical, and capable of being deployed in a manner that is both safe and cost-effective. (NARP 2007).

• Function  – Materials used in the construction of artificial reefs should be known to attract and support the targeted organisms; both sessile invertebrates that create the ecosystem, and fish species that are commercially and recreationally viable.
• Compatibility – Materials used must be compatible with the environment and marine life.
• Stability – Materials must be stable and resistant to movement
• Durability – Materials must be resistant to deterioration and break up over time.

Challenges for the Project
Looking at the projects that people did in previous year, many of them had a ‘solutions’ or something like a call for action section. Referencing that, we put a ‘solution’ category in the wire frame, however in our topic there is nothing concrete to solve. We’ve been spending time finding something similar in place of that and that has been a challenge so far.

Possible Solutions
As our project topic is more informative more than anything, there is nothing specific to ‘solve’, thus leading to a lack of ‘solution’ section. Rigs to Reefs are not necessarily bad, but there are oppositions and controversy around it, but that is not something we can ‘solve’. As to take this topic further, rather than just being another information page, we could offer our own insight on what each side can do to collaborate, but then the site might not be seen as neutral anymore. Nonetheless, perhaps we could take a step back for the ‘solution’ section and address it from a boarder scope. Specifically, we could provide insight and solutions to lessen the damage oil rigs do to marine life and talk about ways how citizens can help preserving marine life.

References
https://www.bsee.gov/what-we-do/environmental-focuses/rigs-to-reefs
http://www.rig2reefexploration.org/read-me
https://psmag.com/environment/rejiggering-the-rigs
https://chooseyourcurrent.org/2018/04/how-offshore-drilling-works/
https://www.newsdeeply.com/oceans/community/2018/05/18/rigs-to-reefs-giving-oil-platforms-a-second-life-for-conservation
https://tpwd.texas.gov/landwater/water/habitats/artificial_reef/rigs-to-reefs.phtml
https://aoghs.org/offshore-history/rigs-to-reefs/
https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/crude-habitat/
https://www.offshore-technology.com/features/featuredisused-oil-rigs-living-reefs-pictures/
https://petrowiki.org/Offshore_decommissioning
https://mission-blue.org/2017/07/viewpoints-rigs-to-reefs/
https://www.boem.gov/BOEM-Newsroom/Library/Publications/2000/2000-073.aspx

What is Rig to Reefs?
The practice of converting decommissioned offshore oil rigs into artificial reefs.

Rigs-to-Reefs provides an alternative to complete rig removal in which an oil company chooses to modify a platform so that it can continue to support marine life as an artificial reef. Through this decommissioning process, the oil well is capped and the upper 85 feet of the platform is either towed, toppled in place, or removed. Not all platforms are suitable as reefing candidates, and in order for any platform to be considered for reefing, it must first undergo extensive ecological evaluations to assess any potential value it might add to the local ecosystem.

When a platform is reefed, the oil company saves a significant portion of the costs normally associated with complete removal. The potential savings to the oil industry from converting all of the rigs off California to reefs, rather than removing them, could be more than $1 billion, by one estimate. But under the law, oil companies would be required to put at least half of the money they save into state coffers to fund conservation programs in California.

Once a rig stops producing at economic rates, the site is usually simply abandoned due to the cost and work it takes to decommission a platform. However, in USA, the Mineral Management Service requires operators to remove the rig within a year of stopped production. The concept of Rig to Reefs was first explored in the late 1970s when they realized offshore platforms are artificial habitats. They notice that around these structure there is an increase in algae and invertebrate along with a significant increase in the numbers and species of fish. The ocean is a big empty place and animals tend to concentrate around objects. Also, invertebrates need things to latch onto and fish want to hide in nooks and crannies, or just be around anything with a little structure to it. However, when an offshore rig is removed from the environment, it takes away the habitat that it created and disrupts those organisms residing at the site. Moreover, explosive removals of rigs are estimated to kill over 800 fish. Therefore, as an alternative to total removal, Mineral Management Service encourages Rigs to Reefs.

Moreover, In 1984 Congress passed the National Fishing Enhancement Act (NFEA) which provided the basis for artificial reef programs. The NFEA spawned the National Artificial Reef Plan of 1985. This plan cleared the way for government-endorsed artificial reef projects and subsequently the Minerals Management Services’ Rigs-to-Reef program. If the Rigs-to-Reefs option is expected to be less expensive than removal, the platform owner pays half the estimated savings to the state agency receiving the former platform.

Of the estimated 6500 offshore oil and gas exploration structures worldwide, approximately 4000 reside in the Gulf of Mexico.
The Gulf of Mexico region contains the largest number of oil and gas platforms – some 4000 platform structures. The US have active rigs to reefs programs that utilize obsolete jackets for the construction of inshore artificial reefs or maintain the platform in position following decommissioning (for leisure purposes, such as diving). Funding comes from federal aid in sport fishing restoration program

Issues Concerning Rig to Reefs

Many environmentalists are against Rig to Reefs as it is a program that benefits the oil industry (by saving them money in decommissioning). As such, Rig to Reefs contributes to new offshore oil development. Some charge that rigs-to-reefs is an excuse for ocean dumping. Environmental groups have long opposed oil companies and frame their critique around distrust of the industry, particularly with regard to Rigs-to-Reefs in offshore California.

References

https://aoghs.org/offshore-history/rigs-to-reefs/
https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/crude-habitat/
https://www.offshore-technology.com/features/featuredisused-oil-rigs-living-reefs-pictures/
https://petrowiki.org/Offshore_decommissioning
https://mission-blue.org/2017/07/viewpoints-rigs-to-reefs/

Stakeholders Ideation
Here are some stakeholders we are considering and their level of interests and influence.

Data Types and Approaches to Visualize the Data Types

Ratio. For example,

• Number of rigs/rigs to reefs and where they are located (using maps).
• Increase or decrease of the number and species of fish/algae/invertebrate around rigs (using graphs).
• Comparison of cost savings between rig to reefs and different decommission methods (using graphs).
• Comparison between other artificial reefs (cost, quantity, quality) eg. https://www.outdooralabama.com/saltwater-fishing/artificial-reefs

Precedent Works to Visualize Data

Challenges

Some challenges include keeping an unbiased stance on whether these rigs have an overall good or harmful impact. From an environmentalist approach, all oil rigs are considered harmful to the environment and allowing oil companies to leave them up partially is enabling oil companies to build more offshore oil rigs. Specifically, the challenge for our project is that we have to have a right balance in the amount of information that fairly balances both sides of the argument. In addition to that, it will be difficult to transform data into something visual, easy to understand and aesthetically pleasing.

As it is still early into the project, we expect to find solutions to the design challenge through more research in precedent works and learning ways to present information in ways that are efficient and effective through the course. Nonetheless, we’ll still be actively looking for more ways to present information. As for the former challenge, our group will closely research both sides of the argument and try to find a perspective that is as unbiased as possible considering all the stakeholders.