Three European firms win Angola deepwater deals
Three European companies have won contracts for almost half the value of Angola's $16 billion ultra-deepwater Kaombo oil project, confirming a trend toward bigger scale and risk for the deep-sea contracting and construction sector. Saipem of Italy announced a $4 billion contract related to fitting out and supplying two converted oil tankers to become the Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) part of the project. Meanwhile, Paris-listed Technip and crane-ship specialist Heerema revealed a $3.5 billion deal for subsea tubes, pipes and cables to connect the two FPSOs to the seabed two kilometres below the surface. Heerema said the contract was the biggest on record of its kind.
Safety Issues May Cause More Petrobras Stoppages
Brazil's state-run oil company Petroleo Brasileiro SA could face new production stoppages on platforms in the Campos Basin if it does not resolve lingering safety issues, the Folha de S. Paulo newspaper reported on Sunday. The company, best known as Petrobras, has improved safety standards in its offshore fields in the last two years but needs to improve "a lot"," a federal labor-law prosecutor, Mauricio Coentro, told the newspaper. If continuing problems are not resolved, platform shutdowns may be necessary, he added. The paper said there have been eight accidents since November in the Campos Basin, located east and northeast of Rio de Janeiro, where Brazil gets 80 percent of its 2.11 million barrels per day of oil output.
