Surface heating for Arctic vessels and structures to prevent snow and ice accumulation

The world's energy demands have continued to stretch innovation and technology to aggressively pursue oil and gas reserves. Recent advancements in harvesting shale oil have slowed the race to define and develop the offshore Arctic energy resources, but the need to continue the planning and preparations for production is still present. The prevention of accumulation or melting of snow and ice on outdoor stairs, handrails, walkways, and other exposed and uninsulated surfaces represents growing interest for Electrical Heat Trace (EHT) technology. For harsh Arctic environments, EHT is being installed on, in, and/or under surfaces to reduce unsafe icing conditions during normal operations or during emergency conditions. This is particularly important for safety systems and those surfaces associated with emergency personnel evacuation. A paper on this topic was presented at the 2012 IEEE/IAS-PCIC Conference in New Orleans, LA, USA, and has subsequently been published in IEEE Transactions . This is one of the few independent articles published on this topic, but is not thought to be impacting any updates in philosophies and progress on the International Maritime Organization (IMO) Polar Code. The latter are relevant to a wide range of design and operational matters of ships operating in polar regions. This will affect the oil & gas companies which may consider operations in polar regions and particularly the electrical engineers involved in their Marine, Operations and Transportation Divisions. Classification societies have guidelines and prescriptive requirements for winterization but there exist vast and unique range of systems, arrangements, environmental conditions, and operational profiles which often don't make the prescriptive requirement applicable to many situations. The “IEEE 45.8 Recommended Practice for Electrical Installations on Shipboard - Cable Systems” will reference EHT for heating pipes, tanks, and instrumentation on-board ocean-going vessels. The globally recognized ANSI/IEEE 515 and IEC 60079-30 standards address “traditional” freeze protection and temperature maintenance applications on-board tankers and Floating Production, Storage, and Offloading (FPSO) facilities, which are quite often hazardous locations. However, none of these standards address heating requirements to keep uninsulated metal surfaces above 0°C.