Subsea-to-surface Oil Transport in an Ambient Pressure Seawater Duct Applied fluid dynamics of a buoyancy guide for oil spill recovery

An applied fluid dynamics analysis is presented of oil droplets rising through an ambient-pressure subsea pipe or duct, which we describe as a buoyancy guide. This is applied to a novel method of subsea oil spill recovery from a broken subsea choke under ambient pressure at depth. We use a conventional Newtonian analysis to provide a first approximation of the buoyancy of oil droplets through this guide. We optimize a configuration with respect to the fluid dynamics of this system in order to optimise the mass transport of the oil droplets, and then propose a sample application. We find that a collection of narrower ducts is more efficient than one wide duct to deliver droplets of oil to the surface under their own buoyancy.