Drydocks World completes major offshore conversions for West Africa
A renaming ceremony held yesterday at Drydocks World (DDW) in Dubai marked the completion of two major offshore projects that will underpin oil production in Côte d’Ivoire, West Africa, for at least 15 years.
The Voyageur Spirit, a floating production storage and offloading vessel, originally a 45,145 dwt chemical tanker built in 2008, has undergone extensive refurbishment and upgrades before being renamed FPSO Petrojarl Kong yesterday.
Meanwhile, the 150,939 dwt shuttle tanker Nordic Brasilia, built in 2004, will work in tandem with the FPSO. It has been converted into a floating storage and offloading vessel and her name has been changed to FSO Yamoussoukro.
DDW deployed more than a thousand workers every day on each project. The conversions have been designed to ensure that both units can operate without requiring intermediate dockings. The FPSO Petrojarl Kong is now a circular unit with a diameter of 70m. The complex conversion took 14 months and involved significant demolition work, the installation of new modules, new structural steelwork, and major coatings work.
The FSO Yamoussoukro project took 11 months. It involved structural refurbishment, life extension provisions, and major work on coatings in cargo and ballast tanks.
DDW Chief Executive Officer, Capt. Rado Antolovic, said: “Today’s naming ceremony celebrates the successful execution of these projects and reaffirms our commitment to delivering innovative solutions and setting new industry standards. We are grateful for the opportunity to have partnered with Altera Infrastructure, Eni, and Petroci Holding on these complex projects, which we were able to fast-track while maintaining the highest quality. We look forward to continued collaborations and future successes.”
The ceremony took place as Oslo-based Rystad Energy released figures showing that global recoverable oil reserves have held largely steady this year at around 1,500 billion barrels, down by 52 billion barrels from its 2023 figures. The total oil resource gives an upper limit of how much oil can be produced over the next 100 years or more, the firm explained.
However, the upper limit is only realistic and economical if oil demand is not affected by the energy transition, meaning oil prices would rise far above $100 per barrel. In this theoretical ‘high case’, Rystad said that total oil production would peak around 2035 at 120 million barrels per day before declining steeply to 85 million bpd by 2050.