Q: Can you provide a brief introduction to Fugro?
A: Fugro delivers technical information about the earth to support construction, infrastructure, and natural resource projects. We work on land and in marine environments all over the world, combining local geophysical and geotechnical expertise with global resources.
Alaska is a great example of how we work best. Our Anchorage office, led by Rada Khadjinova, stays tuned to client needs and issues that influence projects in Alaska. She and her staff coordinate with experts from our Site Characterization and Asset Integrity business lines to provide acquisition, analysis, and consulting services throughout a project’s lifecycle.
Q: How is Fugro responding to the downturn in the oil and gas market?
A: Innovation, both in terms of technology offerings and internal alignment. This is how we stay relevant, ready, and resilient. There are several new and newly adapted technologies with good potential for Alaska oil and gas clients. Satellite derived bathymetry is one. It can be difficult and expensive to acquire water depth information in certain parts of the state, especially when it requires mobilizing vessels to remote locations. These data are critical when considering development alternatives. In some instances, we can use relatively inexpensive satellite imaging data in lieu of vessel-based methods to improve bathymetric knowledge and de-risk development decisions.
Another innovation is our seabed seeps mapping capability, which is a geochem study that combines geophysical and geotechnical datasets to help industry and government clients identify, with confidence, areas of high exploration value. In an era of low oil prices, this economical approach to exploration is very much in-demand,and is generating excellent results.
On the land side, we are using cone penetrometer test (CPT) methods to mitigate permafrost soil instability. While CPT is a flagship of Fugro innovations dating back to the 1960s, modern CPT investigations can isolate the precise cause of soil instability in permafrost to help reduce or eliminate infrastructure damage caused by heaving or subsiding soils.
Q: You also mentioned internal alignment. Can you tell us more about that?
A: Globally, we have had to adjust our workforce to match the realities of the marketplace. With challenge comes opportunity, though, and Fugro has reshaped the company for a successful future. That work actually began ahead of the market turn, specifically to meet the expectations of our customers more efficiently.
By the end of 2016, we had realigned our organization from multiple divisions to just two: Land and Marine, and focused all of our services under two similar business lines: Site Characterization and Asset Integrity. On the Marine side, this means we have integrated our geotechnical, geophysical, and subsea services, within Site Characterization and Asset Integrity, which now work seamlessly across regions. To us, Site Characterization means greenfield, feasibility-type investigations that provide certainty to engineers as far as soil conditions are concerned, while Asset Integrity focuses on geo-intelligence during operations, maintenance, and subsequent project phases.
In addition to making us a more efficient organization, these changes are providing greater value to our clients. With this “one Fugro” approach, we continuously improve delivery excellence and innovation across states, regions, and countries.
Q: How have these changes impacted Fugro’s Alaska operations?
A: The Alaska office has for years been a model for the “one Fugro” approach. Our work on the Alaska LNG project is a good example. In 2016, we closed out a three-year geotechnical and geophysical campaign in Nikiski on a proposed onshore liquefaction facility, marine terminal, and offshore pipelines. The Alaska team helped design and execute the annual field programs, manage local subcontractors, and communicate with client leads. These contributions were formally recognized by the client, which is incredibly satisfying to our entire organization. Fugro continues to support the AK LNG project under the leadership of Alaska Gasline Development Authority.
Q: What is Fugro’s outlook for Alaska?
A: Despite the current oil and gas market, we remain optimistic about the state’s future and are committed to a continued presence in the state. Ongoing work and recent finds by majors and independents have been encouraging, as has been the emphasis on improved transportation infrastructure. And, as we’ve done for many years, Fugro continues to work in non-oil-and-gas markets, collecting baseline datasets for multiple client uses.
Q: What do you mean by baseline datasets?
A: Baseline data helps government and business perform mission critical activities. In Alaska, I would identify topographic base maps, hydrographic charting, and coastal mapping as three fundamental baseline datasets. Over the past decade, the state and its federal partners have made real progress on the topographic mapping front. Topographic maps combine imagery and elevation layers and inform decisions on transportation safety, disaster preparedness, mitigation, and recovery, resource management, energy, infrastructure, and economic development.
Hydrographic charting is an ongoing effort of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), for whom Fugro is a contractor. While updating Alaska’s charts is a stated priority for NOAA, funding is not adequate to meet the need, especially considering increased traffic in the Arctic region. Uncharted shoals are a real hazard, as evidenced by perennial vessel groundings and the icebreaker Fennica accident a few years back. The need for updated charts was recently documented by members of an Arctic-Related Incidents of National Significance Workshop on Maritime Mass Rescue Operations. The danger isn’t just for the vessels who run into trouble, but for the responders too.
And that brings me to coastal mapping, a framework that merges shallow water, shoreline, and coastal elevation data for a seamless depictions of the land-sea interface. This information is important not only to emergency response, but also to national security, economic development, and energy policy. It is also a key input to understanding and monitoring the effects of coastal erosion, which is a concern for communities and industry alike given potential impacts on existing and planned infrastructure. But while coastal mapping programs are commonplace to other coastal states, that’s not the case for Alaska.
Q: Alaska doesn’t have a coastal mapping program?
A: Surprisingly, no. In the Lower-48 states and Hawaii, coastal mapping is primarily accomplished through the National Coastal Mapping Program (NCMP), an effort managed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in coordination with multiple other stakeholder agencies. The NCMP does not apply to Alaska, however, and most of Alaska’s coastal mapping data is decades old.
It’s not all bad news, though. There is growing awareness of the need for a coastal mapping program in Alaska. One bright spot was last year’s Alaska Coastal Mapping Summit, hosted by NOAA. While focused more on coordination of existing projects than initiating a comprehensive one, it’s a step in the right direction. Additionally, the Digital Coast Act introduced in January, co-sponsored by Senators Murkowski and Sullivan, could help fill Alaska’s significant coastal mapping data gaps. The bill passed the Senate in May by unanimous consent, which is encouraging. Fugro was part of the California Seafloor Mapping Project years ago, so I’ve seen this start at the grass-roots before and I’m confident it can happen in Alaska, too.
Q: Where can people learn more about Fugro?
Our Alaska staff can be reached at [email protected]. Our website is www.fugro.com. And, we are also active on social media.