Page 70: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (August 1996)

NEW MARKETS

Storage & Power "To Go"

Mobile and cost effective, both FPSO's and floating powerplants are catching on — respectively — with companies eager to capital- ize quickly on promising oil discoveries and developing countries hungry for power

Time and money drive business decisions, and it is these two factors primarily responsible for driving a boom in FPSO and power barge contracts.

Time was the prime consideration in Mobil

Oil's decision to produce a half million-acre con- cession offshore Equatorial Guinea in West

Africa from a floating production, storage and offloading system (FPSO).

A successful discovery well and two subse- quent appraisal wells established the Zafiro field as commercial. Mobil's Equatorial Guinea,

Inc. (MEGI) unit initiated a fast-track develop- ment program "to get on stream fast and find out what we've got," according to Art Green,

MEGI vice president.

Enter Oceaneering Production Systems, a

Houston company renowned for its conversions of ships and drilling rigs. After scouring the market, Oceaneering selected 22-year old oil tanker M.T. Swift (incidentally owned by Mobil) for conversion to FPSO Zafiro Producer.

In brief, a FPSO receives raw wellstream flu- ids from production wells, separates the crude oil from the natural gas and water present in the wellstream, and stores the crude onboard for offloading to shuttle tankers. The natural gas is used for fuel aboard the FPSO, and excess gas is flared. The water is cleansed of residual hydrocarbons before being discharged into the sea. "FPSO technology is about 20 years old," said

Oceaneering's Marketing Manager, Chuck

McCabe. "Exxon used an FPSO at its Hondo

Field off the coast of California in the 70s and 80s. It was later decommissioned and sold when the company installed a pipeline in the interest of environmental protection. FPSOs got a shot in the arm a few years ago when a Norwegian- built tanker proved the viability of a monohull production and storage facility in the harsh environment of the North Sea. They are gaining in popularity there, as well as throughout the world with about 30 FPSOs currently in opera- tion. We estimate as many as 45 will be at work (Continued on page 74)

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