Productive state of the oil&gas platforms: A classification proposal for the mining statistical review

Over the last years in Italy, as well as in the rest of the world, the debate about the state of the Oil&Gas production platforms has caught more and more the attention of the media. This activity presents critical issues at social, environmental and economical levels for defining plans of mining closure and infrastructure decommissioning most of all. Establishing a scientific method to classify mining platforms and wells, and identifying an objective and systematic terminology, on the basis of their utility to reservoir production is becoming essential as well. The scientific literature uses a terminology for oil and gas wells, but on the contrary no international standard and common criteria are used for productive platforms. This paper aims at the proposal of a terminology and a classification method that could be adopted by the Italian Authorities for the analysis of the state of offshore Oil&Gas platforms, through the evaluation of the national database of the Italian Ministry of Economic Development - Directorate General for safety of Mining and Energy Activity (DGS-UNMIG).