Author Guidelines

1. Language

Manuscripts must be written in clear, professional, and academically appropriate English. Authors are responsible for grammar, spelling, technical terminology, mathematical notation, abbreviations, and readability.

Manuscripts whose language prevents meaningful scientific or technical evaluation may be returned for improvement before external peer review.

2. Types of Articles

3. General Manuscript Preparation

Manuscripts should be submitted using the current JOPTES manuscript template and should be prepared in Microsoft Word or another format accepted by the journal submission system.

General Requirements

• The manuscript must represent original scholarly work.
• The manuscript must not be simultaneously under consideration elsewhere.
• All authors must approve the submitted version.
• All figures and tables must be numbered and cited in the text.
• References must be checked for accuracy and completeness.
• Permission must be obtained for copyrighted, confidential, proprietary, or restricted material.
• SI units should normally be used.

4. Manuscript Structure

Original research manuscripts should generally follow the structure below. Appropriate variations may be accepted for review, methodological, industrial, or socio-technical articles.

5. Title

The title should clearly identify the principal offshore-production problem, system, technology, methodology, or scientific contribution investigated.

Avoid excessively broad, promotional, ambiguous, or unnecessarily long titles. Uncommon abbreviations should normally not be used in the title.

6. Abstract

The abstract should be self-contained and communicate the essence of the study. It should normally include:

• The offshore-production or socio-technical problem;
• The objective of the study;
• The principal method or dataset;
• The most important quantitative findings;
• The principal interpretation; and
• The scientific, engineering, or societal contribution.

Authors should report specific results wherever practical rather than relying only on statements such as “performance improved significantly” or “the model showed good agreement.”

References should normally not appear in the abstract.

7. Keywords

Provide approximately 4–6 keywords representing the offshore system, methodology, technology, failure mechanism, operational problem, or socio-technical dimension investigated.

8. Introduction

The Introduction should establish the scientific and engineering context and clearly identify why the research is necessary.

The Introduction should establish:

• The engineering or research problem;
• The current state of knowledge;
• Limitations of existing technologies or methods;
• The unresolved research gap;
• The novelty of the study;
• The research objective or hypothesis; and
• The expected contribution to offshore production technology or society.

Literature should be synthesized critically rather than presented as a sequence of disconnected summaries.

9. Materials and Methods

The methodology must contain sufficient information for meaningful scientific evaluation and, where reasonably possible, independent reproduction or verification.

10. Metocean and Environmental Conditions

Studies in which environmental conditions affect offshore-system behaviour should clearly report relevant metocean inputs.

Authors should identify whether conditions represent operational, design, extreme, accidental, or survival cases where this distinction is relevant.

11. Offshore Field and Industrial Data

JOPTES welcomes research using real offshore operational and industrial data. Authors must provide sufficient information to evaluate the provenance, reliability, and interpretation of such data.

Data Classification

Authors should clearly distinguish:

Confidentiality

Facility names, field names, operators, contractors, geographical locations, or commercially sensitive parameters may be anonymized where legitimately required.

Anonymization should not remove technical information necessary to understand or evaluate the scientific conclusions.

Permissions

Authors must ensure that publication of company data, photographs, facility layouts, operating records, incident information, or proprietary information is appropriately authorized.

12. Numerical and Computational Studies

Numerical manuscripts should demonstrate that the selected methodology is appropriate for the engineering problem and that results are sufficiently verified and validated.

Required Numerical Information

• Governing equations or modelling framework;
• Geometry and computational domain;
• Initial and boundary conditions;
• Mesh or spatial discretization;
• Time-step or temporal resolution;
• Material and fluid models;
• Turbulence model where applicable;
• Solver and numerical schemes;
• Convergence criteria;
• Verification and validation;
• Sensitivity or uncertainty analysis; and
• Limitations of the model.

Mesh and Time-Step Independence

Where mesh or time-step selection materially affects results, an appropriate independence or convergence assessment should be reported.

Validation

Validation may use experimental measurements, field observations, analytical solutions, manufacturer information, benchmark cases, or credible published data.

Statements of “good agreement” should be supported by appropriate quantitative evidence.

13. Process and Production Simulation

Studies involving topsides processing, separation, compression, gas treatment, produced-water treatment, LNG systems, utilities, or production optimization should report relevant model assumptions.

Software output alone does not constitute sufficient scientific contribution. Authors should explain the engineering mechanisms underlying important results.

14. Subsea Production and Flow Assurance

Subsea Systems

Manuscripts concerning subsea systems should clearly describe system architecture and interfaces, where relevant.

Flow Assurance

Relevant flow-assurance studies should report appropriate fluid, thermal, geometric, and operational information.

Operating Conditions

Authors should identify pressure, temperature, fluid composition, flow rate, pipe geometry, thermal conditions, operating strategy, and model assumptions where relevant.

15. Floating Production Systems

JOPTES welcomes research involving FPSOs, FLNG units, FSOs, semi-submersibles, spars, TLPs, and related floating-production facilities.

Environmental Conditions

Wave, current, wind, water depth, loading condition, and relevant operating or survival cases should be identified when they influence conclusions.

Mooring and Station Keeping

Mooring studies should report, where applicable, line configuration, material and geometry, pretension, water depth, environmental conditions, vessel offset, line tension, and relevant acceptance criteria.

Offloading Studies

Research involving shuttle tankers, tandem or side-by-side offloading, hawser systems, marine hoses, DP interaction, operational limits, or stakeholder coordination should clearly identify the operating configuration, environmental conditions, constraints, and performance criteria.

16. Integrity, Reliability and Risk Studies

Asset Integrity

Integrity studies should report the system or component, relevant deterioration mechanisms, inspection or monitoring data, loads, material properties, acceptance criteria, and assumptions.

Reliability Studies

Reliability analyses should state the definition of failure, data sources, probability distributions, dependencies, assumptions, uncertainty, and validation where applicable.

Risk Assessment

Scoring and Expert Judgment

Studies using risk matrices, expert scoring, AHP, fuzzy methods, semi-quantitative indices, or similar approaches should explain how scales and weights were developed and should assess sensitivity, consistency, or uncertainty where appropriate.

17. Digital Twin, Artificial Intelligence and Data-Driven Research

Digital Twin Studies

Authors should define clearly what constitutes the digital twin, the physical asset represented, data connection, model architecture, update mechanism, validation method, and intended decision function.

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning

AI and ML manuscripts should normally describe:

Data Leakage

Authors should ensure that training and test datasets are appropriately separated and that data leakage does not artificially increase reported model performance.

Engineering Interpretation

Predictive accuracy alone may not constitute sufficient engineering novelty. Authors should explain how the model contributes to offshore decision-making, reliability, safety, production optimization, monitoring, or asset management.

18. Technology and Society Research

Manuscripts focusing on society, organizations, governance, workforce, or policy must demonstrate a direct relationship to offshore production technology or offshore operations.

Human Participants

Studies involving interviews, questionnaires, focus groups, workforce assessments, or identifiable participants should comply with applicable ethical requirements.

Ethical Approval

Authors should obtain institutional or ethics-committee approval where required and report relevant approval information in the manuscript.

Informed Consent

Appropriate informed consent should be obtained where required by the study design, institution, or applicable regulations.

Confidentiality

Employee identities, organizational records, interview transcripts, operator information, and other sensitive information should be appropriately protected.

Interpretation

Human-factor and safety-culture research should consider interactions among people, organization, technology, procedures, management systems, and operating environments, rather than attributing outcomes to individuals without sufficient evidence.

19. Techno-Economic and Lifecycle Studies

Manuscripts making economic, commercialization, lifecycle, or cost claims should report relevant assumptions.

System boundaries and assumptions should be clearly defined so that economic comparisons are meaningful and reproducible.

20. Standards and Recommended Practices

Authors are encouraged to identify relevant and current engineering standards, recommended practices, regulatory requirements, or classification rules where these are material to the study.

Authors should identify the edition or year of standards actually used. Citation of a standard does not replace the need to explain the methodology implemented.

21. Results

Results should be presented clearly and objectively using appropriate quantitative or qualitative evidence.

Relevant uncertainty, variability, statistical indicators, validation errors, confidence intervals, reliability bounds, or sensitivity results should be reported where applicable.

Avoid unnecessary duplication of identical information in text, figures, and tables.

22. Discussion

The Discussion should explain why the reported behaviour occurs and what the findings mean for offshore-production systems.

Authors should consider:

• Engineering and physical mechanisms;
• Comparison with existing research;
• Verification and validation results;
• Operational significance;
• Production implications;
• Safety and reliability implications;
• Practical implementation;
• Uncertainty and limitations;
• Generalizability to other assets or systems;
• Environmental or societal implications where relevant; and
• Future research needs.

23. Conclusions

Conclusions should directly address the study objectives and summarize the principal scientific, engineering, operational, or societal contributions.

Conclusions must be supported by the evidence presented and should not introduce new results or unsupported commercial claims.

24. Figures and Tables

Figures and tables should be clear, readable, appropriately numbered, and cited in numerical order.

Image Integrity

Photographs, inspection images, CFD contours, structural plots, microscopy images, process visualizations, or other scientific images must not be manipulated in ways that misrepresent the underlying evidence.

25. Equations, Symbols and Units

SI units should normally be used. Alternative industry units may be included when their use is technically necessary, provided conversion and interpretation remain clear.

Variables, symbols, abbreviations, subscripts, coordinate systems, and sign conventions should be defined and used consistently.

Equations cited in the text should be numbered consecutively.

26. References

References must be accurate, relevant, complete, and sufficient to establish the scientific context of the study.

Authors should prioritize appropriate peer-reviewed primary literature, standards, technical guidance, and authoritative sources.

References should follow the citation and bibliography style specified in the current JOPTES template.

Unacceptable Citation Practices

27. Research Data and Reproducibility

Authors should retain original research records and supporting data sufficient to substantiate the findings reported.

Data Availability

Where legally, ethically, technically, and commercially appropriate, authors are encouraged to make supporting data and code available through recognized repositories or supplementary files.

Restricted Data

Proprietary or confidential industrial data need not be publicly disclosed when legitimate restrictions apply.

Authors should describe such restrictions transparently and provide sufficient methodological information for meaningful scientific evaluation.

28. Authorship and Contributorship

Authorship should be limited to individuals who have made substantial scholarly contributions to the research and manuscript.

All listed authors must approve the submitted version and accept responsibility for their respective contributions.

Contributor Roles

Guest authorship, honorary authorship, gift authorship, purchased authorship, and ghost authorship are not acceptable.

29. Declarations

30. Use of Generative Artificial Intelligence

AI Cannot Be an Author

Artificial intelligence systems, language models, chatbots, or other automated tools cannot be listed as authors or co-authors.

Human Responsibility

Human authors remain responsible for all submitted content, including references, engineering calculations, equations, data, code, models, technical standards, interpretation, and conclusions.

Disclosure

Substantive use of generative AI for manuscript preparation, programming, data processing, analysis, visualization, or image generation should be disclosed where applicable.

Verification

AI-generated references, standards, equipment specifications, numerical values, equations, or engineering claims must be independently verified.

Confidential Offshore Information

Confidential manuscripts, proprietary field data, facility layouts, engineering drawings, operational data, or restricted company information must not be uploaded to external AI systems where confidentiality and data protection cannot be assured.

31. Editorial Screening and Peer Review

Every submission is initially assessed by the editorial team for scope, scientific quality, research integrity, methodology, presentation, and minimum reporting standards.

Editorial Outcomes

Reviewer recommendations inform editorial decisions, but final responsibility for acceptance or rejection remains with the authorized editor.

32. Preparing a Manuscript for Double-Anonymous Review

The review manuscript should not contain information that unnecessarily reveals the identities of the authors.

Authors should:

• Remove author names from the review manuscript;
• Remove affiliations from the review manuscript;
• Remove acknowledgements that reveal author identities;
• Avoid unnecessary statements that explicitly identify the authors' institution;
• Remove identifying information from file properties where practical; and
• Provide author metadata separately through the OJS submission system.

33. Revised Manuscripts

When revision is requested, authors should normally submit:

• A revised manuscript;
• A detailed point-by-point response to reviewer comments;
• A clear description of changes made;
• Scientific justification when a suggestion has not been adopted; and
• Additional validation, figures, data, calculations, or documentation requested by the editor.

Responses should be specific, professional, and evidence-based. Replies consisting only of “done,” “corrected,” or “revised” without identifying the actual change should be avoided.

34. Submission Preparation Checklist