Norwegian company DeepOcean has signed up to a five-and-a-half years charter agreement starting March 2016 for a new-build vessel for the North Sea construction market, the main focus being the SURF (subsea umbilicals risers & flowlines) segment in the Greater North Sea area.
The new SALT 304 design vessel will be owned by Østensjø Rederi. Key dimensions will be 149.8m length overall by 27m breadth and 2,300sq.m of total deck space.
DeepOcean said the vessel has been specially designed and equipped to suit the Greater North Sea market. Key features will include fuel saving Siemens BlueDrive PlusC propulsion control technology and DP3 positioning system.
Mission equipment will include a 150-tonne dual-tensioner vertical pipe-lay system and 3,000 tonnes carousel situated below deck; a 400-tonne active heave compensated knuckle boom main crane capable of handling up to 600T in double fall mode.
During the past six months, DeepOcean has strengthened its SURF organisation in the UK and Norway. The company recently opened a new office in Westhill, Aberdeen. Future SURF projects will be managed out of the Norwegian and Aberdeen offices.
“In the last two years, we have hired approximately 450 new employees, upgraded our owned and chartered vessel fleet, increased the number of mission equipment to 33 ROVs and 17 trenchers and generated strong financial results while maintaining a solid balance sheet,” said Bart Heijermans, CEO at DeepOcean Group Holding.
“We currently operate 11 vessels in our home market, the Greater North Sea, managed by our talented employees in Norway, UK and the Netherlands.
“The addition of this new SURF vessel further differentiates our company as a new generation IMR (inspection, repair, maintenance) contractor and a lead subsea installation contractor.
“The addition of the SURF vessel provides us with the opportunity to serve our customers as a lead contractor and offer commercial benefits resulting from the bundling of our services.”
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