Maersk Decom planning Tullow’s decom work in Mauritania As an up-and-coming area for decommissioning, Africa is following developments in more mature areas, such as the North Sea.
One company with experience of European operations is Maersk Decom, and it has experience – through affiliated companies – of work in Africa.
“We have a head start in West Africa. Because of our ownership structure, involving Maersk Drilling and Maersk Supply Service (MSS), we have experience up and down that coast. We also have access to local knowledge via A.P. Møller Maersk presence and we’re taking advantage of that,” Maersk Decom’s CEO Lars Banke told Energy Voice.
Offshore execution work will be run from Maersk Line’s office in the Mauritanian capital of Nouakchott, demonstrating the ways in which one company can benefit from another. Maersk Decom is a 50:50 joint venture of Maersk Drilling and MSS.
The company won work for Tullow Oil off Mauritania in February this year. It will handle the permanent plug and abandonment process on the Banda and Tiof fields. The company drilled seven exploration and appraisal wells on the area between 2002 and 2008.
“We’re a one-stop shop, offering an end to end solution. That must have appealed to Tullow and when they came out with an integrated tender solution it was clear that was something we could do,” Banke said.
The Banda and Tiof fields are 53 km and 84 km respectively offshore, in 1,200 metres of water. On plan
Speaking at the time, Tullow’s chief operating officer Mark MacFarlane noted the company’s recent decommissioning work in the UK continental shelf. Tullow “successfully contracted out complete decommissioning and plugging and abandonment scopes to specialist contractors. We are looking forward to working jointly with Maersk who provided us with the most convincing offer.”
Since the award to Maersk Decom, the world has changed and travel is a much more challenging notion. Fortunately for the timetable, the company had always intended to carrying out engineering and planning during this period.
The plan was submitted at the end of September, Banke noted. “The next phase of surveying starts in December, that may take 10 days offshore. We will gather data to reconsolidate the plugging and abandonment campaign.”
The next step will see the regulator approve the P&A design. Tullow handles the responsibility for that and it is not clear how long that may take.“We hope it would be approved in the first quarter of 2021. That would […]