Keppel’s orderbook continues to grow

The rig will be built to the SSAU4000NG design from Keppel O&M’s Deepwater Technology Group, with DP3 capability. This will be Keppel FELS’ third accommodation semi project for Floatel, following the delivery of Floatel Reliance and Floatel Superior in 2010. The SSAU4000NG is an enhanced version of the SSAU3600 design, which meets the stringent UK HSE requirements, allowing it to operate in the North Sea as well as the Gulf of Mexico, Brazil and Western Australia. It provides increased comfort for 500 personnel, accommodated in one-man and two-man cabins.

This order follows close behind another, in which Keppel FELS has been contracted by Seadrill to build a further semisubmersible drilling tender based on the KFELS SSDT3600E design. The order is valued at $142 million. Scheduled for delivery in the second quarter of 2013, this is the eighth drilling tender that Keppel will be building for Seadrill since the launch of the design in 1994.

Meanwhile, Keppel Shipyard has announced that it is on track to deliver its latest FPSO project, Armada TGT 1, to Bumi Armada. The vessel will be deployed in the Te Giac Trang (TGT or White Rhinoceros) oil field, in Vietnam’s Cuu Long Basin, for Hoang Long Joint Operating Company. It is expected to strike first oil in the third quarter of 2011. At full capacity, the unit will be able to produce 55,000 barrels/day and store 620,000 barrels of oil.