Contracts & Projects Tracker - Jan 2011

KBR subsidiary Granherne has been selected by GDF SUEZ Bonaparte Pty Ltd to execute the upstream pre-FEED study for the Bonaparte LNG project, a proposed floating liquefaction plant to be located in the Bonaparte Basin, Northern Territory, Australia. The project, being developed through a joint venture between GDF SUEZ and Santos Ltd, has a planned LNG capacity of 2,000ktpa.

Aberdeen-based subsea service company DOF Subsea UK has secured an £8m contract with Technip for the provision of a light construction vessel in the North Sea. The work is scheduled to start in Q2 2011, and to take place in 2011 and 2012 using DOF Subsea’s vessel, the Geoholm, utilising the two WROVs onboard. The project is expected to have a minimum duration of approximately 170 days.

Norway’s Electromagnetic Geoservices and Shell have teamed up via a joint industry project to plan and design the next generation of 3D electromagnetic equipment. A six-month feasibility study will target the development of new source, receivers and positioning systems. Mark Rosenquist at Shell Exploration & Production’s exploration research unit said: “The next-generation system will at least double the number of hydrocarbon prospects we can evaluate with EM.”

Konecranes UK’s Industrial Crane Division in East Kilbride has won the crane supply contracts for two power station projects in India. The projects are being handled by Siemens with Torrent Power Ltd for UNOSUGEN – a 382.5MW gas-based combined cycle power project – the capacity expansion at the existing SUGEN Mega Power Project and for the greenfield DGEN Project at Dahej SEZ – a 1200MW gas-based combined cycle power project.

Metso will supply Oü Helme Energia with a biomass power plant in Helme, Estonia for start-up in Q3/ 12. The CHP unit will be delivered by the Metso-Wärtsilä JV MW Power. The Euro15m-plus order includes an automation system from Metso Automation. The plant will employ bubbling fluidised bed technology and will use spruce bark, chipped logging residues and wood chips or milled peat to produce 15MW of heat and 6.4 MW of electricity for the customer’s own pellet factory and the national grid.

Foster Wheeler has signed a contract with Shanghai Boiler Works Ltd for cooperation in the design of two pulverised coal (PC) steam generators for the Vinh Tan II Project for Vietnam Electricity. Shanghai Electric Group, the parent company of Shanghai Boiler Works, Ltd., is the EPC contractor for the project in the Binh Thuan Province of South Vietnam. FW will provide the design review of the two 622 MWe PC’s for Shanghai Boiler Works Ltd, a licensee for PC technology.

Total E&P UK has made a new gas and condensate discovery in the West of Shetland on the UK Continental Shelf, close to the currently under development Laggan and Tormore fields. The Edradour exploration well lies in block 206/4, 75km NW of Shetland in a water depth of 300 metres. Total has a 75% operating interest in the Edradour licence, with DONG E&P UK Ltd holding the remaining 25%.

Malaysia’s KNM Group has announced that its KNM Process Systems Sdn Bhd subsidiary has won a £450m EPC contract in the UK. The deal covers the engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning of works for the development of the EnergyPark Peterborough - an 80MWe energy-from-biomass and waste recycling centre in Peterborough. The four-year contract is with Peterborough Renewable Energy Ltd.

Grimley Smith Associates has recently won a contract with the Centre for Process Innovation (CPI) and Tata Steel. The Brigg, North Lincolnshire-based process engineering consultancy has also announced that it has recently concluded a significant FEED project for Nippon Gohsei related to modifications at its UK plant in Hull.

INEOS Bio and JV partner New Planet Energy have received a conditional commitment for a $75 million loan guarantee from the US dept of agriculture’s 9003 Biorefinery Assistance Program. Funds will be used for the construction of the world’s first INEOS BioEnergy Center to be situated near Vero Beach, Florida. The BioEnergy Center will produce 24,000 tonnes of biofuel per year together with six megawatts (gross) of renewable power from biomass including yard, vegetative and wood wastes and municipal solid waste.

BP International Ltd has awarded HP Enterprise Services UK Ltd a five-year outsourcing services agreement, worth over $400m. HP will deliver global data center services to enable BP to standardise and consolidate its hosting services and take advantage of innovations such as cloud computing. HP currently provides HP Data Center Services to BP’s European data centers in the UK. The new deal brings the remaining BP data centers in Europe and all those in the Americas regions under a single contract that covers data center management services, including monitoring, back up and recovery, site management and maintenance services, to database.

Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. has received a three year contract from North Atlantic Refining Ltd for the provision of turnaround and small capital work services at the company’s refinery in Newfoundland. North Atlantic is owned by Harvest Operations Corp – part of Korea National Oil Corp. and a significant operator in Canada’s energy industry.

KBR has completed its £106.6m acquisition of the 44.94% stake in MW Kellogg Ltd (MWKL) previously held by JGC Corp. With the completion of the transaction, MWKL, which was previously an affiliate of both companies, is again a wholly-owned KBR subsidiary. MWKL is to continue its operations in Greenford, UK, complementing KBR’s Leatherhead operations. The units jointly will serve as KBRs London Center of Operations, creating one of the largest engineering and construction organisations in the UK.

Amiad Filtration Systems has completed the first stage of its project providing a salt leaching brine filtration system for an underground liquid hydrocarbon storage facility in France. The underground facility - one of the largest and most strategic oil reserves in France - consists of stored liquid hydrocarbons (such as crude oil and gasoline) in 27 salt-leached caverns and has a capacity of 7.5 million cubic metres. Read more

Foster Wheeler has a contract with Kuwait Petroleum Int. Lubricants (KPIL) to provide detailed engineering services for a brownfield lube oil blending plant to be built at Antwerp, Belgium. The plant will enhance the ability of the Antwerp facility to operate at European scale by increasing the production capacity from 125m to 250m liters/year. KPIL is increasing the plant’s capacity to keep pace with the growth of its Q8Oils and Roloil branded business and to give it the option of toll blending.

Aker Solutions has been awarded the tie-in and connector scope associated with the Goliat flowlines and risers contract by Technip Norway. The NOK65m contract comes in addition to Aker having been awarded the Goliat subsea production system last year by ENI. Aker also has the direct electrical heating contract for the Goliat project under Technip’s flowlines and risers contract. The project will be executed mainly in Norway, with the delivery of the final equipment expected during Q2/13.

URENCO UK Ltd has awarded Aker Solutions a contract to provide the front end design engineering and interface support for a new tails management processing and storage facility at URENCO’s Capenhurst site in North West England, UK.  This new  storage facility is a major combined nuclear and chemical development for UK industry.

Aker Solutions has won a NOK900m contract to build and install a new compressor module on the Statoil-operated Kristin platform in the Norwegian Sea. The modification is to increase recovery from the field and accelerate production by adapting the platform to changes in reservoir pressure. Delivery is due in Q1 2014 , said Aker, which previously carried out FEED work for the Kristin LPP modification.

ConocoPhillips has conditionally awarded an EPC contract for the topside module for the Ekofisk 2/4 Z platform to Aker Solutions. The contract is subject to project approval by the PL018 license group, and Norwegian authorities’ approval of the plan for development and operation (PDO). The PL018 approval is planned for the first quarter 2011 and PDO approval in Q2/11.

Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. is to purchase a number of Aker Solutions’ process and construction (P&C) operations. The $675m acquisition, adjusted for cash and debt acquired is due for completion by Q2/11, subject to regulatory approvals. The deal, said Jacobs, will significantly expand its position in the global mining and metals market; provide a new geographic region with South America; and strengthen its presence in China.

Qatar Petroleum and Shell have signed an agreement to jointly study the development of a major petrochemicals complex in Ras Laffan Industrial City, Qatar. The scope under consideration would include a mono-ethylene glycol plant of up to 1,500ktpa using Shell’s proprietary OMEGA technology and other olefin derivatives to yield over 2m tonnes of finished products. The companiies are already building Pearl GTL and Qatargas 4 LNG, two of the largest projects in the world in Ras Laffan.

Fluor Corp.’s Bohai Phase II development project was named by Platts as its engineering project of the year at the recent 2010 Global Energy Awards. Jointly owned by ConocoPhillips and China National Offshore Oil Corp., the project is located 140 miles offshore in Bohai Bay, China, and included the development of an oil field with a capacity of 190k bpd of oil production. The FPSO, one of the largest in the world, is over 320 meters long and can store two million barrels.

ABB has won several orders collectively worth $42 million to provide power supply infrastructure and equipment for several FPSO vessels. The vessels will produce crude oil off the coast of Brazil; they will be operated by several oil and gas producers, with Petrobras as the end customer. The orders were booked during the third quarter.

ExxonMobil has completed an expansion to the world’s largest carbon dioxide capture plant. Located near LaBarge, Wyoming,the $86m expansion includes the installation of compressors to capture 50% more carbon dioxide for potential use in enhanced oil recovery and other industrial uses. The plant can now capture approx. 365 million cubic feet per day of CO2 from the gas streams.

Severn Trent Services has renewed an agreement with the Lanxess to distribute its Bayoxide E IN-20 and Bayoxide E33HC media, which remove arsenic, heavy metals and inorganics in wastewater treatment. The five-year agreement will continue to give STS the rights to offer the Bayoxide technology to global municipal wastewater and industrial sectors. It also has exclusive global rights to provide Bayoxide E33 media for drinking-water applications.

BASF’s catalysts division is to market Haldor Topsøe’s tail gas treatment catalysts, which are used to remove sulphur compounds as the last stage of a Claus sulphur recovery unit in order to meet local emission standards. The agreement covers all regions of the world, with the exception of North America. The tail gas treatment catalysts associated with this agreement are complementary to BASF’s existing adsorbent product portfolio.

Medicine Bow Fuel & Power LLC has awarded Aker Solutions the FEED package for its industrial gasification and liquefaction plant near Medicine Bow, Wyoming. Aker did a pre-FEED study for the project in July 2010 and has since worked under a letter of intent to provide services relating to design review, licensor support as well as extra pre-EPC engineering and design. The project only the second of its kind anywhere in the world. The facility is due to come on line in 2015: eventually converting coal into up to 21,000 barrels per day (BPD) of gasoline and LPG liquid fuels.

Foster Wheeler has acquired the CEntry sulfur recovery technology from FLSmidth & Co. The acquisition includes patents, know-how and skilled personnel. The technology is used to treat gas streams containing hydrogen sulfide (H2S) to reduce the sulfur content of fuels and recover a saleable sulfur by-product. It includes a sulfur recovery section based on the Claus process, an amine-based tail-gas treating section, an incinerator with waste heat recovery, and proprietary burners.

A/S Norske Shell is to extend a five-year maintenance and modification contract with Aker Solutions, exercising a two-year option for the Draugen and Ormen Lange fields, up last until December 2012. The NOK1-1.5bn contract includes studies, engineering, fabrication, installation as well as commissioning,  and employs 600 people. Aker is also currently involved in projects related to test facility for subsea compression for Ormen Lange and produced water injection at Draugen.

Fluor Corp. and SIBUR are to establish a JV with the Scientific Research and Design Institute for Gas Processing (NIPIgaspererabotka) in Krasnodar, Russia. Fluor will initially commit a 10% stake in the SIBUR design institute. The JV will then launch a pilot project for the design and construction of the Yuzhny Balyk-Tobolsk gas pipeline, which will connect the South Balyuk gas processing plant with the Tobolsk petchem complex. The JV aims to become a leading engineering, procurement and construction management service firm for the oil and gas markets in Russia and the CIS.

V&M TWO LLC has awarded Aker Construction Inc. a contract for the construction of a pipe mill process building in Ohio, US.   The contract for fabrication, supply and installation of materials to erect the building commences immediately. The project is located adjacent to the V & M Star L.P.’s operations in Youngstown, Ohio. 
 
SOCAR & TURCAS Rafineri AS (STRAS) - a JV of the State Oil Company of the Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR) and TURCAS Petrol AS - has awarded Fluor Corp. a project management consultant contract for a new refinery to be built in Aliaga, Turkey – to be integrated at the Petkim petchems site on the Aegean coast. As PMC for the SOCAR & TURCAS Aegean Refinery (STAR) project, Fluor will assist in selecting and managing the EPC) contractor(s) and provide overall project and construction management.

Costain is still awaiting payments from AE&E Inova AG, with whom it has a sub-contract for a major part of the works at the Belvedere energy-from-waste facility. AE&E Inova is continuing to trade and has advised Costain that in relation to their search for a new investor it has “binding offers from well-known strategic investors”, said Costain. Read more

Archer Western Contractors has awarded Siemens Water Technologies with a $7m contract to supply 11 Memcor CP membrane filtration systems for the City of Scottsdale, Arizona, Water Campus Advanced Water Treatment (AWT) Facility expansion. Siemens will also provide unit control panels and membrane system programming.

Alfa Laval has won an SEK70m order for compact heat exchangers from a refinery in Russia, for delivery in 2011. The units will be used in the distillation process of the refinery, where the crude oil is pre-heated for further refining into high-value products such as gasoline. The compact heat exchangers enable recovery of heat from other parts of the process to preheat the oil.

Foster Wheeler has been awarded a basic engineering design and front-end engineering design (FEED) contract for two grassroots refineries in Brazil for Petrobras. The Premium I Refinery will be a dual train, 600,000 barrels per stream day (BPSD) facility in Maranhao State, and the Premium II Refinery will be a single-train 300,000 BPSD facility in Ceara State. FW will be the prime subcontractor to Honeywell’s UOP, the managing process technology licensor. Read more

John Wood Group PLC is to acquire PSN Ltd for $955m, and merge it with Wood Group’s production facilities business to create global brownfield production services unit, called Wood Group PSN. Energy services company PSN, which employs over 8,000 and operates in 23 countries, has 2010 sales and earnings of around $1200m and $100m, respectively. Read more

Wood Group GTS has a five-year gas turbine term maintenance agreement by Stadtwerke München (SWM), which supplies gas and electricity to the Munich area. The contract covers maintenance of SWM’s two GE Frame 9E gas turbines, and includes local contract management support, field service, parts repair and supply of parts for planned and unplanned outages.

Jacobs Engineering SA (JESA), a JV between Jacobs Engineering Group and OCP SA – is to provide engineering, procurement and construction management (EPCM) services for OCP’s latest diammonium phosphate (DAP) and monoammonium phosphate (MAP) production plant, to be constructed in Jorf Lasfar, Morocco. The project involves the construction of four identical new production DAP and MAP plants to be built and commissioned in six month intervals between July 2013 and July 2015

BASF has completed its Euro3.1bn acquisition of Cognis Holding GmbH from Cognis Holding – controlled by Permira Funds, GS Capital Partners and SV Life Sciences on 9 Dec. The equity purchase price was Euro700m, excluding debt and pension provision.

Teesside Gas & Liquids Processing has signed agreements with RWE Dea UK SNS Ltd and Sterling Resources (UK) Ltd that will bring gas from the Breagh discovery to Teesside for processing. The Breagh field, operated by RWE, is one of the North Sea’s largest gas discoveries in recent years and the project will involve the construction of a new offshore platform and pipeline to bring gas ashore at Coatham Sands, Redcar where it will be piped via a new onshore pipeline to the Teesside Gas Processing Plant, located at Seal Sands, for processing.

ERIKS has acquired all shares in Valtor Offshore, based in Esbjerg, Denmark. Valtor primarily services the North Sea and the international oil and gas industry with valves, actuators and valve automation systems for oil and gas production installations and for maintenance applications.

Shell is selling a group of gas fields in South Texas to OXY USA Inc., part of Occidental Petroleum Corp., for $1.8bn approx, as part of an ongoing portfolio restructuring.

Solutia is upgrading its facility in Gent, Belgium to produce multi-layer rolls of Saflex acoustic polyvinyl butyral sheet for automotive applications. The new capacity will be deployed within the current boundaries of the Gent plant, leveraging existing infrastructure. The upgrade will enable the production process to be highly automated.

AxFlow Ltd has been appointed exclusive UK distributor for the European built range of Wemco recessed impeller torque flow pumps. The sales and distribution agreement, from 1 Jan 2011, covers vortex impeller pumps used in food and industrial processing applications where fluids contain high levels of solids, fibrous materials and aggressive slurries.

Keithley Instruments Inc. has completed the merger with Aegean Acquisition Corp., part of Danaher Corp., into Keithley. 

Tube and pipe distributor Van Leeuwen Wheeler has acquired the Aberdeen assets of Mardale Pipes, a supplier of duplex and super duplex stainless steel to the oil and gas industry.

Wood Group’s Alliance Engineering has been selected by EPC contractor Daewoo Shipping and Marine Engineering to provide jacket and topsides engineering and design for Chevron’s South Nemba Auxiliary (SNX) project, in Angola’s Nemba field, in water approx. 380-feet deep.

Petrobras has selected Emerson as the main automation contractor to provide process automation technologies and services for the major Petrochemical Complex of Rio de Janeiro (Comperj) project in Brazil. Emerson will deliver engineering services and technologies for process automation and systems integration of the refining unit, selected utilities, and offsite operations that are part of the Brazilian energy group’s project. Read more

Jacobs Engineering has received a contract from CPC Corp. to design and license Jacobs’ proprietary EUROCLAUS technology for a desulfurisation unit as part of the Ta-Lin refinery expansion project in Kaoshiung, Taiwan. Read more

Engineering plastics company Nylacast has deployed an Infor ERP SyteLine throughout its UK operations, and will soon extend this to its US operations. The system is designed to enhance key business processes, while improving production planning and help Nylacast to improve customer service and increase revenues. The project was Nylacast’s biggest ever change-management project. Technology consultancy CCL helped define the IT requirements and aided the selection processes.

Petroleum Development Oman (PDO) has awarded a seven-year engineering and maintenance services contract to Wood Group - CCC, a JV set up to provide operations and maintenance services for the oil & gas and petrochemical industries in Oman, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE and Yemen. The contract, which has a three year extension option, will include integrated engineering, construction, maintenance and support services for existing PDO facilities onshore in southern Oman.

Tecpetrol is employing Emerson Process Management’s Smart Wireless technology, based on the IEC 62591 (WirelessHART) standard, to increase production while reducing maintenance and operations costs at natural gas compression and delivery facilities in Argentina. Read more

An energy saving heating and cooling system installed at one of Nestle’s UK chocolate factories has earned an industry award for its designer, Star Refrigeration. Star’s ammonia heat pump plant at Nestle’s confectionery production facility in Halifax, West Yorkshire, has won an RAC Cooling Industry Award as the industrial and commercial project of the year. Read more

The WH Sammis air auality control project was named Construction Project of the Year at the 2010 Platts Global Energy Awards. EPC Bechtel, in conjunction with Babcock & Wilcox and Stantec Consulting Services, retrofitted the air quality system to reduce gas emissions at the FirstEnergy-owned 2,220MW, coal-fired power plant in Stratton, Ohio. Some had thought project impossible due of its scope, complexity, confined spaces and need to keep the plant operating, said Robert Kasper, Bechtel’s project director.

Yokogawa Engineering Asia Pte Ltd has won an order from Marubeni Corp. to supply the control system for the Nghi Son 1 thermal power plant (two 300 MW units) being built by Vietnam Electricity (EVN) in the Nghi Son district of Thanh Hoa Province, in the northern part of the country. Read more

BASF and PETRONAS are to undertake a joint feasibility study to produce specialty chemicals in Malaysia, a move that would extend the two parties’ existing business collaboration in the country. The partners are considering a potential joint investment sum of approximately Euro1.0bn.

National Grid has started commercial operations at the second capacity expansion of its Isle of Grain LNG importation facility.
Following the arrival of the first commissioning cargo of LNG on 29 Oct, the commissioning process has been completed in just over a month, delivering a 50% increase in terminal capacity for the start of winter. Read more

Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. has three framework contracts from National Grid to provide project services over a three-year period (from July 2010) to support its investment in gas transmission/distribution, carbon capture and storage, and property. Jacobs’ remit includes project management; project controls; cost management; field services; and HSE management. The scope includes the new build/up-rating of gas pipeline and compressor projects resulting from changing patterns of supply and demand, and new CO2 transportation networks.

Hima-Sella is constructing a high integrity alarm system for a ’major UK refinery’. Due for installation in Q1/11, it will replace another vendor’s system, for which support is no longer available. The new system is being built around a HIMA HIMax programmable electronic system (PES), which offers protection to SIL 3. It will interface with nine legacy alarm systems (each with up to 120 alarms) around the refinery and a workstation for displaying the status of each alarm. It also includes dedicated workstations for use in the refinery’s two independent process streams.

Wood Group GTS has been awarded an EPC contract, worth around $875m, from Dorad Energy to build an 800MW power plant in Israel. The natural gas-fired plant is due online within 36 months and when completed will represent about 8% of Israel’s total installed power generation capacity. Wood Group GTS has full turnkey responsibility for the combined-cycle plant, which will utilise 12 natural gas-fired turbines connected to a heat-recovery steam generator that will provide steam to run two steam turbines.

Aker Solutions has been awarded the NOK3.4bn Åsgard subsea compression system contract by Statoil. The scope includes a subsea compressor manifold station, subsea compressor station template structure, three identical compressor trains, all electrical control systems, high voltage power distribution system, and topside equipment. Subsea compression creates pressure for hydrocarbons to travel up the pipelines to the receiving terminal.

CB&I company Lummus Technology has been awarded a contract by Liaoning Tongyi Petrochemical Co. Ltd for the license and engineering design of grassroots OCT olefins conversion units and CATOFIN dehydrogenation units at several of its sites in China. The units will produce isobutylene and propylene.

Total has launched phase 2 of the $1bn development of the West Franklin field, after receiving approval from the UK Government.The field is located in Blocks 29/5b and 29/4d in the UK sector of the North Sea, about 240km east of Aberdeen. The phase 2 development is aimed at producing estimated reserves of 85m barrels of oil equivalent (boe): drilling three wells and installing a new platform tied back to the Elgin/Franklin facilities. Production is expected to start by late 2013 and reach 40,000 boe/day.

GE Intelligent Platforms has received a $4.5m order for its Proficy Process Systems from Brazil cement company Cimentos LizThe Soeicom SA company, which has plants in Vespasian in the metropolitan region of Belo Horizonte, will use the system for a plant upgrade to control raw mill, furnace, packing and crushing applications, among others.

Gazprom and Royal Dutch Shell plc signed a protocol on strategic global cooperation, which envisages: Further development of their bilateral cooperation in exploration and production of hydrocarbons in western Siberia and the far east of Russia; Cooperation in the downstream oil products business in Russia and Europe, as well as Gazprom participation in Shell upstream projects outside of Russia. Shell and Gazprom will set up joint working groups to further develop these opportunities.

Chevron has engaged Reliable Manufacturing to help establish a reliability programme at its Pembroke refinery. This includes a master class, focused on the way processes and equipment are designed, operated and maintained. Chevron intends to put all 300-plus operations and maintenance staff at the refinery through the programme over the next 18 months.

Hazardous area equipment maker Extronics has reported record sales in the year to 31 Oct. A 37% export-led, sales increase on the previous year was linked to demand for its iCAM501 intrinsically safe digital camera - claimed to be the only ATEX Zone 0 certified camera in the world. The product has seen particularly strong demand in the marine and oil & gas sectors. Read more

Air Liquide has signed a long-term agreement with Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd (RINL), the second largest state-owned steel company in India. Air Liquide will supply oxygen and nitrogen for an RINL expansion from 3000 to 6300ktpa of steel. Located in Vizag, this new facility will address the south India market, complementing Air Liquide’s foothold in the north and west of India. Air Liquide will build and operate two air separation units with a total installed oxygen capacity over 1,800 t/day, to start up in 2012. It will also produce large quantities of liquid gases (oxygen, nitrogen and argon). Air Liquide’s investment is around Euro70 million for the production facilities and the supply.

Cornish machine builder Western Mechanical Handling (WMH) UK Ltd has recently developed technology – using servos from Mitsubishi Electric – for depositing Yorkshire pudding batter into baking moulds for a frozen foods manufacturer. Read more

KSB Group’s Spanish unit KSB ITUR is to supply 57 cooling pumps for use in a CELLS consortium-operated particle accelerator known as “Synchrotron Alba” which is currently under construction. The process pumps are designed for flow rates of up to 646 cubic metres and a maximum discharge head of 134 metres, and the pump motors have a total power of 1,60kW. Read more