Prosafe Production’s innovative hybrid Azurite floating, drilling, production, storage and offloading vessel (FDPSO) is on its maiden voyage en route from the Keppel Shipyard in Singapore to its first contract – working offshore the Republic of Congo.
The company said that the world’s first FPSO capable of drilling and producing in deepwater fields will be deployed on Murphy Oil’s deepwater Azurite field development in the Mer Profonde Sud block.
The Azurite FDPSO incorporates a design that is cost-efficient and effective for drilling and production. It is equipped with a modular drilling package that can be removed and reused elsewhere once production wells have been drilled.
The vessel, which is a conversion from a trading tanker, has a storage capacity of 1.4million barrels of oil, can process some 60,000 barrels per day of fluids (40,000 barrels of oil per day) and can be spread-moored in water depths to 1,400m.
Prosafe Production was responsible for the FPSO conversion, while Murphy handled the drilling side.
At completion and handover, Prosafe Production became responsible for the operation and maintenance of the vessel, while Murphy shouldered drilling operations.
Murphy is the operator of the Mer Profonde Sud block and the Azurite field with 50% interest. Other stakeholders comprise PA Resources with 35%, and the Congolese national oil company, Societe Nationale Petroles du Congo, which has the remaining 15%.
On the conventional rigs front, a variety of deliveries have taken place in recent weeks or are expected within the next few months, so whittling a bit further at the backlog of orders that has built up over the past several years.
Keppel FELS of Singapore has delivered the jack-up rig, Deep Driller 8, to Aban Singapore on time, within budget and without incidents.
Deep Driller 8 is the fifth unit to be delivered in a series of five KFELS Super B Class rigs for Aban since 2006. The design is one of the world’s most advanced rigs, with capabilities for drilling high-pressure, high-temperature wells as deep as 10,700m (35,000ft) in a water depth of 107m (350ft).
With the on-time delivery of the Deep Driller 8, Aban said it expected its entire offshore fleet to be operational shortly.
The KFELS Super B Class design is an enhancement of the KFELS B Class design. To date, 26 KFELS B Class rigs have been delivered, with another seven in various stages of construction.
Turning to semi-submersibles, Odfjell Invest has taken delivery of the new-build Deepsea Atlantic from Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering (DSME). The rig has a contract with StatoilHydro for the next four years.
“The delivery by the shipyard is an important milestone in this project. The rig will now be moved from South Korea to Norway, where certain trials will be carried out before it starts on the contract with StatoilHydro, which is expected to take place in May,” said Ketil Lenning, CEO of Odfjell Drilling.
“The project has been demanding in terms of both complexity and technology, but as a result of excellent co-operation with DSME shipyard and the drilling equipment supplier, NOV (National Oilwell Varco), we have succeeded in building a drilling rig of the highest quality.”
The contract to build the unit was signed with DSME shipyard in South Korea in 2006. It was delivered 35 months later after a record of 20 months’ construction time from the start of steel cutting.
Deepsea Atlantic is designed for both ultra-deep waters and for the most demanding environments. It was built in accordance with Norwegian regulations and is said by Odfjell to be equipped with the best available technology in terms of crew safety, environmental considerations and efficient drilling operations.
This rig is a part of Odfjell’s fleet renewal strategy. Next in line is sister rig Deepsea Stavanger, on which construction has started. It is scheduled for delivery by DSME in Q2 2010. Additionally, Odfjell has, in co-operation with Metrostar, two drillships under construction in South Korea for delivery in 2011.
At Transocean, expectation is that the first of the three ultra-deepwater drillships contracted by Reliance Industries, the Dhirubhai Deepwater KG-1, will be delivered during Q3 this year.
Reliance has contracted three new-build ultra-deepwater drillships from Transocean at a cost of about $2.86billion to undertake the exploration and development drilling of its KG-D6 fields in the Bay of Bengal, Eastern India.
Reliance is to pay about $928million each for the Dhirubhai Deepwater KG1 and KG-2 drillships and $1.01billion for the third drillship, which is yet to be named.
The Dhirubhai Deepwater KG1 is nominally capable of drilling in water depths to 3,600m (12,000ft) to a total depth of 10,680m (35,000ft).
It (formerly the Deepwater Pacific 1) and the Dhirubhai Deepwater KG2 (formerly Deepwater Pacific 2) are jointly owned by Transocean and Pacific Drilling. The 50:50 joint-venture Samsung 1000 drillships are currently under construction in South Korea at Samsung Heavy Industries. The third drillship is an Enterprise-class unit.
Reliance, which should start gas production from KG-D6 about now, currently has three Transocean rigs operating on its behalf – the Deepwater Frontier, since August, 2008, at $477,000 per day; the Deepwater Expedition, at $375,000 a day, since July, 2008, and the Discoverer 534, at $250,000 a day, since December, 2007.
The Frontier is on hire to Reliance until September, 2011; Expedition until October, 2010, and Discoverer 534 until January, 2011.