Petroleum and natural gas industries — Specific requirements for offshore structures — Part 4: Geotechnical and foundation design considerations

ISO 19901-4:2016 contains provisions for those aspects of geoscience and foundation engineering that are applicable to a broad range of offshore structures, rather than to a particular structure type. Such aspects are:

- site and soil characterization;

- identification of hazards;

- design and installation of shallow foundations supported by the seabed;

- design and installation of pile foundations;

- soil-structure interaction for auxiliary structures, e.g. subsea production systems, risers and flowlines (guidance given in A.10);

- design of anchors for the stationkeeping systems of floating structures (guidance given in A.11).

Particular requirements for marine soil investigations are detailed in ISO 19901 8.

Aspects of soil mechanics and foundation engineering that apply equally to offshore and onshore structures are not addressed. The user of this part of ISO 19901 is expected to be familiar with such aspects.

ISO 19901 4 outlines methods developed primarily for the design of shallow foundations with an embedded length (L) to diameter (D) ratio L/D < 1 (Clause 7) and relatively long and flexible pile foundations with L/D > 10 (Clause 8). This part of ISO 19901 does not