J+S with their Legacy Locker: a circular Economy approach to the decommissioning model

J+S has emerged in 2020 from a management buyout of the Subsea Engineering Division of Systems Engineering and Assessment Limited, a Cohort business. The team at J+S have provided subsea engineering solutions to the Oil & Gas and Renewable Energy sectors for over 20 years and as part of the buyout chose to return to an updated version of the J+S brand name they have previously been known as.

The existing management team of Executive Chairman Matt Blair, Business Development Director Simon Smith and Engineering Director James Morris have stayed with the company while new Managing Director Phil Reid has re-joined the team having previously worked for the company.
J+S is leading the way in the Oil & Gas industry to optimise the value of existing, unwanted capital equipment and combat the downturn in the offshore market. J+S is committed to adjusting economic, social and environmental behaviours to build a resourceful and sustainable future. To support this goal and to avoid large quantities of fully functional equipment simply being scrapped, J+S has developed their Legacy Locker service over the past 5 years in order to realise the economic value of refurbishing existing unwanted capital equipment and provide better options to their customers.

So what is Legacy Locker?

• It is a repository of all the spares needed to maintain production
• It is a store of new and used parts owned and held by J+S
• It also acts a notional store of parts made available by our clients
• It is an engineering service to test, refurbish and recertify or reverse engineer obsolete items
• It is a brokerage service for higher value items owned by Oil & Gas service companies
• It gives the option to buy, sell and trade your unwanted stock or refurbish and recertify existing stock
• It is an option for decommissioned equipment other than scrap
• How does Legacy locker work?

J+S identified that there has been a shortage of critical components that often have a long lead time. Initially the Legacy Locker started by identifying the types of components that our customers have used previously and would like to have available off the shelf and a lot of these components were found to be common across the industry such as hydraulic couplers and electrical subsea connectors which could take up to 26 weeks to order brand new. Budgets were set aside in order to make sure that these vital components could be held in stock. With the step up in decommissioning activities through the later life of subsea assets it was identified that a lot of equipment coming back from offshore for scrappage had the components required as part of the assemblies as well as spares packages on the shelf that were no longer required. With J+S having extensive experience in the refurbishment and recertification of existing equipment, this provided an avenue to reclaim some of these parts and provide our clients both with a new avenue to dispose of their unwanted equipment and feed a future source of similar equipment for when it is actually required. J+S has supported a number of our clients buying their unwanted stock and giving them options for their urgent operational requirements On 2 fields in the last year alone, the Legacy Locker has given our clients the ability to keep their production going by having the necessary components available to regain lost control.

Legacy Locker in the future

Going forwards Legacy Locker has and will continue to evolve with greater stocks of used and new equipment being made available to promote reuse and the wider circular economy. In order to further this, decommissioning and metal recycling specialists, John Lawrie, and Subsea Engineering equipment re-use and refurbishing experts, J+S will work together in order to enhance the recovery and re-use of subsea control equipment.

With full approval from the producer of the material, operational teams from John Lawrie and J+S will be able to identify and recover subsea equipment and materials from future decommissioning projects suitable for refurbishment, recertification and resupply through the J+S Legacy Locker service.

Speaking on behalf of John Lawrie Julian Foley commented: “The circular economy is at the heart of what John Lawrie does so this gives us a real opportunity to increase the amount and type of materials that can be re-used by oil and gas operators in order to support their ongoing operations, as well as helping to meet their net zero and sustainability goals.”

Matt Blair, Executive Chairman, J+S, added “This arrangement with John Lawrie will give us access to both unused spares and serviceable decommissioned equipment that previously would have gone directly to recycling. Working with our clients on our Legacy Locker service has highlighted this issue. Now, together with John Lawrie, we can ensure that subsea equipment is reused whenever possible, while the remainder is recycled through Lawrie’s SEPA registered sites.”

If you have spares equipment that is not required or a decommissioning project coming up that includes controls systems please feel free to contact the team to see how J+S can give you another option info@jands.co.uk

Read the latest issue of the OGV Energy magazine HERE.