At the Offshore Technology Conference (OTC) in Houston, Hamworthy is exhibiting the technology responsible for its continuous penetration into the offshore market, examples of which include onboard LNG regasification plant, offshore floating LNG production plant, FPSO deepwell pumps and inert gas plant.
Hamworthy’s offshore business is expanding, complementing its marine and onshore activities. Hamworthy specialists have extensive experience in supporting the offshore exploration and production sector with environmentally friendly, innovative and integrated equipment solutions. These benefit vessels engaged in every stage of oil field development, from exploration and construction through to production and maintenance, including: seismic vessels, drillships, semi-submersible rigs/jack-up rigs, production test ships, FPSOs/FSOs (floating production, storage, offloading/ floating storage, offloading units), LNG and LPG FPSOs, shuttle tankers, intervention vessels, pipe layers, and crane vessels.
Hamworthy’s offshore business unit is currently marketing the company’s economic, flexible, safe and robust technology for FLNG (offshore floating LNG production). “Hamworthy specialises in the design, manufacture, and turnkey delivery of offshore liquefaction plant as part of the FLNG topside,” said the company’s offshore director, Stein Thorsager. “Our LNG process combines the very latest in gas technology with improved overall efficiency, still keeping the robust, safe, compact and simple design which is vital for offshore floating applications.”
Onboard LNG regasification is another good example of Hamworthy’s offshore innovations, and the company delivered the first plant to site last summer. This onboard vaporiser system was for installation on the 145,000m3 LNG shuttle regasification vessel (SRV) Suez Neptune. SRVs are designed to transport and store LNG, and then vaporise it into natural gas that can be sent ashore by subsea pipeline.
Suez Neptune is the first of two SRVs ordered from Samsung in South Korea for Höegh LNG to serve the Neptune terminal in Boston, Massachusetts. Gas trials are scheduled for August 2009.
Hamworthy is supplying three regasification skids per ship. Each ship set will have a regasification capacity of 210 tonnes/hr of LNG with a send-out pressure of 115 bar.
In June 2010 gas trials will be taking place on the second Neptune SRV, Suez Cape An.
“This project combines the very latest in gas technology with environmental and safety regulations to meet the ever increasing demand for natural gas to the US market,” said Dag Karsten, Hamworthy’s project manager for LNG regasification. “There is considerable interest in further offshore LNG terminal services being established, which will require LNG SRVs.”
Hamworthy’s second LNG regasification project comprises plant for a 138,000m3 LNG floating storage and regasification unit (FSRU), Golar Winter. This vessel will be chartered by Petrobas in an LNG import project located in Guanabara Bay, Brazil, where gas will be sent from the vessel to an onshore gas grid. Gas trials and start-up are due to take place in July 2009.
The third project is for the FSRU Golar Freeze for Dubai Supply Authority (DUSUP) and Shell in Dubai, for which Hamworthy is delivering the regasification skids in September 2009.
Last year Hamworthy signed its largest single contract for pumps so far, when Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co Ltd (DSME) ordered 30 electric-drive deepwell pumps from Hamworthy Gas Systems AS for Total’s Pazflor FPSO. Two months later Hamworthy Moss AS signed a contract with DSME for an inert gas generation unit for the same FPSO.
The Pazflor development is located about 150km off the coast of Angola. Drilling operations are planned to commence in 2009 and oil production is scheduled to start in 2011. The Pazflor FPSO will have a processing capacity of 200,000 barrels of oil per day and be able to store 1.9 million barrels.
he FPSO’s IG plant will have a capacity of 9,500 Nm³/h. “Hamworthy was chosen as the preferred supplier mainly because of its proven track record with offshore projects such as AKPO and AGBAMI, as well as its long and trusted relationships with DSME and Total,” said Geir Hellum, managing director of Hamworthy Moss AS.
“Both of these contracts are major milestones for Hamworthy’s offshore business,” Mr Thorsager said. “Not only was the pump contract an achievement in itself, but the delivery of 30 deepwell pumps of 32 m in length has opened up a new product segment for Hamworthy in the offshore market, namely process pumps as well as more traditionally cargo and ballast pumps installed in the FPSO hull. This contract is also an important step forward into oil majors’ huge FPSO projects, such as Total’s, as up until now this market has been dominated by hydraulically-driven pumps”.
FPSO deepwell pumps featuring electric drives made a breakthrough in 2004 when Hamworthy was selected to supply the cargo handling system for the 900,000-barrel storage capacity FPSO Nganhurra, built by Samsung Heavy Industries and operating at the Enfield oilfield in Australia for Woodside. Since then Hamworthy’s electric-drive deepwell pumps have been selected for several FPSOs. “A clear indication of the success for electric-drive deepwell pumps is seen in the relationship we have built up with the second largest FPSO operating company in the world, MODEC, by entering into contracts for cargo pump deliveries for its three latest FPSOs: Stybarrow Venture MV16, Pyrenees and Cidade de Santos MV20,” Mr Thorsager said.
