Keppel delivers FPSO conversion, wins repeat orders

Source: Sea Trade Asia

Singapore: On completion of its second FPSO conversion for Maersk Contractors, Keppel Shipyard has won a further Flaoting Production Storgae Offloading vessel order from that customer. It has also won another FPSO conversion from fellow repeat customer BW Offshore - for the first US Gulf of Mexico FPSO. Together the new contracts are worth over S$215 million.

The completed vessel, the Maersk Ngujima-Yin ('dream' in Aboriginal language), was handed over on February 2. Formerly it was the 308,000dwt tanker vessel Ellen Maersk, on which conversion work started in early 2007.

"The new FPSO is best in class and the biggest ever to work in Australia," said Claus V. Hemmingsen, CEO of Maersk Contractors, upon delivery. It will operate at a water depth of 350 metres on the Vincent field in Australia and is capable of handling a daily production capacity of 120,000 barrels of oil and 100 million standard cubic feet of gas per day. The storage capacity of the vessel will hold 1.2 million barrels of oil equivalent.

The follow-on FPSO will have a new VLCC hull that is due to arrive in the yard from China in the fourth quarter of 2008, and is expected to complete by end 2009. Mr Nelson Yeo, Executive Director of Keppel Shipyard, said, “We are delighted that Maersk Contractors has entrusted us with a second FPSO. This is a vote of confidence to the good work we have accomplished together on the first vessel, which is nearing completion. We look forward to continuing our excellent partnership to deliver yet another quality project.”

Meanwhile, BW Pioneer Ltd, an affiliate of BW Offshore, has awarded Keppel Shipyard a contract to convert the first FPSO for the Cascade and Chinook fields in the US Gulf of Mexico (GoM). When completed in the third quarter of 2009, the FPSO will be turret moored at a water depth of around 2600 metres �" the deepest waters ever for an FPSO. It is designed to disconnect and move by its own propulsion to safe waters from an approaching storm.

To be named BW Pioneer, the FPSO will have a storage capacity of about 600,000 barrels of oil, a process capacity of 80,000 bopd and gas export facilities of 16 mmscfd. This FPSO unit will be leased by Petrobras America Inc, and production on the Cascade and Chinook fields is expected in the first quarter of 2010. The latest FPSO conversion awarded to Keppel Shipyard by BW Offshore is the second since the conversion of FPSO Berge Helene (pictured) in 2005. [06/02/08]