Oil And Gas Platform News

Shell has reportedly threatened legal action against Greenpeace activists who last week boarded a heavy load carrier carrying Shell's Penguins FPSO, destined for deployment in the UK North Sea.Last Tuesday, four activists climbed aboard the Boskalis' White Marlin vessel carrying the cylindrical FPSO, in the Atlantic Ocean north of the Canary Islands, calling for Shell to "Stop Drilling. Start Paying." Read more here.According to Greenpeace, Shell, late on Friday, Feb 3, hit the…

Classification society and assurance provider DNV has awarded Odfjell Oceanwind an Approval in Principle (AiP) for its new Deepsea Semi floating wind foundation design. The Deepsea Semi floating wind foundation design has been developed for use in floating wind farms and for off-grid applications including temporary electrification of oil and gas installations in harsh environments.The Deepsea Semi foundation is dimensioned for up to 15MW wind turbine generators and has been developed for low-cost, industrial mass-production.

Equinor reported the oil industry's first coronavirus infection on an offshore installation on Wednesday, highlighting the challenge in preventing contamination for thousands of workers living in the close quarters on rigs and platforms.A worker was in isolation on the Norwegian energy firm's Martin Linge oil and gas platform off Norway where production is due to start at the end of this year, the company said. It said it would cut activity at the field, but personnel would remain at installations, while workers would reduce meetings and sit further apart in canteens to prevent further contamination. It has 776 people working on the project spread across three installations, Martin Linge, the Maersk Intrepid drilling rig and the Floatel Endurance accommodation rig.

Gulf Marine Services (GMS), the leading provider of advanced self-propelled self-elevating support vessels (SESVs) serving the offshore oil, gas and renewable energy sectors, is looking at acquisitions due to opportunities in the market, reported Gulf News. GMS, which supports the oil and gas and renewable energy sectors with barges, has a fleet of fourteen vessels that help in offshore oil and gas platform refurbishment and maintenance activities, offshore wind turbine maintenance work, as well as offshore oil and gas platform installation and decommissioning, among other things. The report quoted its chief executive officer Duncan Anderson as saying: "There is more room for consolidation with other businesses in future.

Air New Zealand said its Gas Turbines business unit has been awarded four contracts from the U.S. Navy worth up to $42 million to service its fleet’s gas turbine engines. The contracts will see the Auckland based Gas Turbines team carry out maintenance and overhaul work of the General Electric LM2500 gas turbines that power much of the U.S. Navy fleet for the next few years. Air New Zealand Chief Operations Officer Bruce Parton said the contracts are an important win for the airline, and the company participated in aa competitive bidding process to secure the work. Air New Zealand Gas Turbines is a business unit of Air New Zealand, providing gas turbine overhaul and repair services to clients across a range of industries.

Effective May 1, Lasse Petterson has assumed the role of chief executive officer (CEO), a provider of dredging, environmental and remediation services. In his over 35-year career, Petterson has gained extensive experience in the engineering, construction and maritime industries. His international experience includes time working and living in Norway, Asia and the U.K. to oversee operations and major projects in Australia, Middle East and South America. Most recently, Petterson served as a private consultant to clients in the oil and gas sector. Petterson served as chief operating officer (COO) and executive vice president at Chicago Bridge and Iron (CB&I) from 2009 to 2013. Prior to CB&I, Petterson was CEO of Gearbulk, Ltd.

Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, Ltd. today announced a plan to acquire a 5% share in Seajacks International Limited (Seajacks) Group, which owns and operates five Self-Elevating Platform vessels(*1), from Marubeni Corporation. This is a new offshore business for MOL, following FPSO(*2), FSRU (*3), shuttle tanker (*4), and subsea support vessel (*5). It is also the first step to move into the renewable energy business field through involvement in installation of offshore wind power generation systems, which is expanding in Europe and other areas around the world. MOL continually contributes to environmental protection in areas and ports worldwide…

The Board of Directors of Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Corporation, provider of dredging, environmental and remediation services, announced the selection of Lasse Petterson as CEO, as well as his appointment to the company’s board of directors. Petterson will join the Board immediately and assume the role of chief executive officer once his application for U.S. citizenship, as required by the Jones Act, is finalized, which is expected in Q1 2017. During this time, Lasse and current CEO Jonathan Berger will work to ensure a seamless transition. Petterson brings to the role 35 years of experience in the engineering, construction and maritime industries.

DONG Energy <IPO-DONG.CO> has terminated a contract to build an oil and gas platform for its Hejre field, postponing indefinitely the major development offshore Denmark, the Danish majority state-owned utility said on Tuesday. DONG said the supplier consortium, Technip France and Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering, had not been able to meet its commitments under the contract. DONG, which operates the field and holds a 60 percent stake, and Germany's Bayerngas, which has the remaining 40 percent, will assess alternatives to develop the field and will work closely with the Danish authorities, DONG said. The project, originally planned to start in late 2015…

Three workers are missing after an accident at an offshore oil platform in the Caspian Sea in Azerbaijan, Azeri state energy company SOCAR said on Friday.   SOCAR said a small cabin, where workers were living, was washed into the sea from the platform during a heavy storm.   "The accident did not affect the oil production process," the SOCAR spokesman, Nizameddin Guliyev, told reporters.   He said that a search-and-rescue operation was underway.   Four workers were killed and one went missing after a fire broke out on SOCAR's other oil and gas platform in the Caspian Sea in Oct. 2014. (Reporting by Nailia Bagirova; writing by Margarita Antidze; editing by Jane Merriman)

SBM Offshore, the Dutch oil and gas platform leasing company, reported better than expected first-half profit on Wednesday after slashing costs and said it would double annual savings at a time of low oil prices. SBM Offshore, which has said it will cut 1,500 staff, or more than 10 percent of its global workforce, expects annual savings of about $80 million compared with previous guidance of $40 million. It also increased its 2015 revenue forecasts to $2.6 billion, from $2.2 billion…

BP Plc, citing low oil prices, tried to whittle away at $13.7 billion in potential fines under the Clean Water Act on Tuesday as the penalty phase started in its trial over the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill. BP said its fine should be modest as it took extensive steps to mitigate the worst offshore disaster in U.S. history and that the defendant named in the case, BP's exploration and production unit, known as BPXP, cannot afford a big penalty. "There has been no collapse of the ecosystem," BP lawyer Mike Brock said in opening statements, contending that the Gulf has been more resilient than thought. Environmental groups say it could take decades for the Gulf to recover.

BG Group agreed to the sale of its equity interest in the Central Area Transmission System (CATS) gas pipeline in the UK North Sea and associated infrastructure to Antin Infrastructure Partners for total proceeds up to $954 million. Under the agreement, BG Group will sell its 62.78% interest in CATS for a consideration comprising $888 million on completion of the transaction and a deferred amount of $66 million. The sale does not impact BG Group's rights to capacity in CATS. CATS comprises a fixed-riser platform linked to the Everest oil and gas platform…

Flexible fuels, Bold designs ... Eastern Shipbuilding Group has arguably been one of the more progressive and aggressive U.S. builders of high-spec Offshore Service Vessels in recent years, winning a number of high-profile contracts for operators globally. Eastern recently delivered M/V HOS Red Dawn and christened M/V HOS Renaissance, both for Hornbeck Offshore Services, LLC. HOS Red Dawn (H201) – now delivered – was launched on February 15, 2013. HOS Red Rock (H202) was launched April 19, 2013, and is currently at Eastern completing final outfitting, regulatory and DP-2 trials.

Feds issue Interim Guidelines for reefing old rigs at the same time that NOAA identifies myriad potentially polluting shipwrecks. Salvage opportunities abound. In late June, the U.S. Interior Department revised its interim policy for defunct, offshore oil-and-gas platforms, making it easier to turn them into artificial reefs under an initiative by the agency’s Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement or BSEE. Separately, and at virtually the same time, a new NOAA report that examines national oil pollution threat from shipwrecks has been presented to the U.S. Coast Guard.

It’s a powerful proposal. Keeping a 90-meter, 4,500-deadweight capacity platform supply vessel (PSV) stationary only a few meters from an oil and gas platform, as it transfers fluids, equipment and personnel in challenging weather conditions, is as much about power as it is about precision. With GE Power Conversion's dynamic positioning and vessel automation technologies, the Brazilian Shipyard Detroit Brasil Ltda. is constructing the next generation of PSVs for Brazilian operator Starnav Serviços Marítimos Ltda.

With the deal officially closed on January 31, 2012, the sale of the civilian Blohm + Voss companies – Blohm + Voss Industries, Blohm + Voss Repair and Blohm + Voss Shipyards (plus their subsidiaries) – to the UK investment company Star Capital Partners (SCP) is now complete. The purchase agreement between ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems AG and SCP for the acquisition of these companies was finalized on December 11, 2011. The new owners will continue to manage and develop the Blohm + Voss civilian business units.

ABS has been requested to provide classification services for the test turbine substructure for Wind Energy Systems Technology (WEST) wind farm offshore Galveston, Texas. A three-year wind assessment program evaluating the feasibility of a wind farm offshore Texas has been completed and WEST has reported wind conditions were satisfactory. The next phase is the removal of the meteorological tower from the foundation and replacing it with a 2.75 MW wind turbine. The test turbine has been permitted by the Army Corps of Engineers and will provide power to an adjacent oil and gas platform.  \Following a yearlong testing program, Coastal Point Energy has proposed a field of 52 2.75 MW turbines making the site the first offshore wind farm in US waters.

ABB, the leading power and automation technology group, has won an order worth $110m from Eni Norway AS, to build a power link between a new oil and gas platform in the Barents Sea and the Norwegian power grid. The order was booked in the first quarter. The Goliat platform will be partly electrified by a 106 km subsea power cable, which can lower Goliat's carbon dioxide emissions up to 50 percent by reducing the need for electricity produced by the platform's gas turbines. The 123kV (kilovolt) 75MW (megawatt) XLPE insulated cable is claimed to be the longest, most powerful cable ever delivered for an offshore application. It will supply AC (alternating current) power from the mainland grid in Norway to Goliat, a floating oil and gas production, storage and offloading unit.

Offshore Solutions B.V. (OSBV) reported that the OAS, mounted onboard the GDF SUEZ E&P Nederland B.V. (GSEPN) chartered vessel, REM Mermaid, has achieved over 1,000 operational connections without any LTIs. An OAS is a heave compensated telescopic gangway, enabling the safe transfer of personnel from a vessel to an offshore installation (wind turbine, oil or gas platform) designed to operate in 2.5 metre Hs (significant wave height) sea states. Weighing approximately 24 tonnes…

BP PLC (BP) reported that its Thunder Horse Gulf of Mexico project faces another setback, as a metallurgical failure will delay first production for at least 18 months pending the rebuilding of all production equipment on the sea bed, according to a Dow Jones Newswire report. The offshore oil and gas platform's new startup date will be mid-2008, a year and a half later than the previous estimate of early 2007, the London-based energy major said. The mammoth Thunder Horse field, the largest oil discovery in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico, has been plagued by delays since the platform was left listing after the passage of Hurricane Dennis in 2005.

According to UPI, Russia's first offshore oil and gas platform, LUN-A, is in operation in the sea of Okhotsk on the Sakhalin Shelf. The platform will be used to drill 27 wells and the produced gas will be transported over a 497-mile pipeline to a liquefied natural gas plant being built in the settlement of Prigorodnoye south of Sakhalin, ITAR-TASS news agency reported. The installation of the LUN-A platform is part of the Sakhalin-2 project run by the Sakhalin Energy international company. Source: UPI

Petrobras 36, the 31,183 ton Offshore Oil and Gas Platform left Sept-Iles, Quebec for Brazil on November 11. The Floating Production System is recorded as the heaviest load ever carried by a submersible heavy lift vessel. Performed by Dockwise of Belgium, the operation entailed the usage of the company's Modern Servant I heavy lift ship and the vessel, together with its large cargo, was scheduled to arrive in Rio de Janeiro by mid-November. Formerly known as the Spirit of Columbus, Petrobras 36 had been at Quebec City Davie Industries undergoing upgrades for the past two years — making the vessel into one of the largest platform of its kind. When in operation at the Roncador Field located offshore Brazil, the vessel will produce 180,000 barrels of oil and 7.2 MM cu.