Across the global oil and gas sector, every major operator, from the Gulf Coast refineries to the deep-water platforms of the North Sea, faces the same stubborn, structural challenge: how to modify, reinforce or expand critical steelwork without shutting down operations, introducing fire risk, or compromising the integrity of ageing assets. It is a dilemma that only intensified as facilities push further into extended service life, and as safety expectations, regulatory scrutiny and cost pressures continue to rise.

For decades, the industry accepted a difficult reality. If a pipeline support needed strengthening, a cable ladder required repositioning, or a temporary landing beam had to be secured during a platform upgrade, the answer was almost always the same: weld it, drill it, bolt it, and brace for the consequences. Fire risks had to be managed, permits issued, production slowed, and workforces kept away from hazardous zones. Even small adjustments often required logistical acrobatics, setting off a domino effect of delays and operational inefficiencies.

But a quiet shift has been taking place driven not by spectacle, but by engineering. Lindapter is the preferred alternative to the conventional construction mindset, offering a method of steel connection that removes on-site welding and drilling from the equation entirely.

 

Instead of hot work, shutdowns, Lindapter’s clamping systems allow steel-to-steel connections to be created using only hand tools, in minutes, and with fully verified load capacities suitable for some of the sector’s most demanding environments.

In an industry that must balance safety-critical operations with relentless pressure to remain productive, the appeal is obvious. Clamping rather than welding eliminates sparks, heat and fire risk, an especially significant advantage on live hydrocarbon facilities. It avoids the bureaucratic and logistical slowdown of hot-work permits. It preserves the integrity of ageing primary steel by avoiding drilling, a key advantage on offshore platforms where fatigue and corrosion are already concerns. And, perhaps most importantly, it allows installations, and even major structural modifications, to take place while the asset remains in operation, minimising shutdowns and preventing routine work from becoming costly disruptions.

This shift is not theoretical. Across the world, Lindapter systems have already been integrated into critical infrastructure on some of the sector’s most recognisable assets.

 

The four projects that we will be talking about in this article illustrate not only the challenges that operators face, but also the practical value of abandoning hot-work-intensive methods in favour of engineered cold connections that simply clamp into place.

Whitemoor Installation, Selby (UK)

At the Whitemoor Installation in Selby, engineers needed to construct heavy-duty pipe support structures capable of carrying significant loads across the plant. Precision mattered: at pipeline joints and transitions, even minor misalignment could trigger serious installation delays. Welds were ruled out due to the risks associated with hot work and the operational environment. Lindapter’s high-slip-resistance Type AF and Type A girder clamps allowed the team to assemble the support structure with millimetre-level adjustability before tightening everything down with basic tools. The result was a fully aligned pipe support system installed without a single spark, without expensive welding labour, and without disrupting the plant’s operations.

ExxonMobil Refinery, Baytown, Texas (USA)

A similar challenge appeared on the other side of the Atlantic, at ExxonMobil’s refinery in Baytown, Texas. Running a new pipeline adjacent to existing infrastructure required long stretches of pipe guides to be installed along cantilever beams, work that had to happen while the refinery remained live. The adjustable Type LR girder clamp offered the right balance of strength and versatility, fitting beams with varied thicknesses and even accommodating slight slopes. The guides were installed across several thousand feet of new pipeline with no drilling, no welding and no interference with production. The refinery avoided the fire risks of hot work and the downtime usually associated with major structural adjustments.

Shell M1 LNG Platform, South China Sea

Offshore, the constraints become even more pronounced. On Shell’s M1 LNG platform in the South China Sea, the deck was undergoing expansion to accommodate an additional gas compression train. Drilling or welding into the existing structural steel was not permitted, both to protect steel integrity and to avoid the hazards of hot work on an offshore installation. Lindapter Type A and Type B girder clamps provided a temporary but load-critical method of attaching landing beams to the platform structure. These temporary connections could be adjusted, aligned and ultimately removed with minimal effort, greatly simplifying a project that would otherwise have required a complex sequence of hot work permits and production reroutes. What could have been a protracted, high-risk operation became a clean, controlled and predictable installation.

Centrica Rough Alpha 47/8A Platform, North Sea (UK)

Perhaps the most striking example, however, comes from the North Sea, where Centrica needed to refurbish a corroding aluminium helideck on the Rough Alpha 47/8A gas platform. The challenge extended beyond the typical constraints around fire risk and offshore welding. Connecting steel to aluminium introduces galvanic corrosion, a long-term durability risk that could compromise the helideck’s safety.

Once again, the installation required no drilling, no welding and no disruption to the platform’s operations. The adjustable clamps allowed the helideck components to be aligned precisely, while providing predictable performance under the dynamic loads generated by helicopter landings and take-offs.

Across these projects, whether onshore or offshore, pipe support or helideck refurbishment, the pattern is strikingly consistent. The oil and gas industry is operating in harsher environments, with older assets, under tighter safety regimes, and with greater pressure to reduce downtime.

 

Traditional construction methods simply impose too much drag: too many permits, too much risk, too many delays. Lindapter’s clamping technology solves a structural problem in a way that is both elegantly simple and deeply engineered, offering predictable loads, independent technical approvals, and rapid installation without hot work.

If there is a single theme emerging from these case studies, it is this: the industry no longer needs to choose between safety and productivity. By eliminating welding and drilling, operators gain both. They reduce fire risk while keeping facilities online. They protect steel integrity while simplifying design. They gain adjustability without sacrificing strength. And they accomplish all of this with a connection method that can be installed in minutes, even in hazardous or logistically constrained environments.

As the global oil and gas sector continues to evolve, tackling life-extension programmes, digitalisation, decarbonisation and the undeniable complexity of ageing infrastructure, innovations in something as fundamental as a steel connection may seem understated. But for the engineers who have lived through shutdown overruns, unexpected fire watches, last-minute design changes and the maddening delays caused by misaligned steel, the impact is anything but subtle.

In the end, the quietest revolutions often come from rethinking the basics. And in steel-to-steel connections, Lindapter has offered the industry something it has long been searching for: a safer, faster, more adaptable way to keep the world’s most critical energy infrastructure moving.