Contracts & Projects: February 2011

CNOOC Ltd is paying $570m for a 33.3% stake in Chesapeake Energy Corp’s 800,000 net oil and natural gas leaseholds in the Denver-Julesburg (DJ) and Powder River basins in Colorado and Wyoming. CNOOC will also fund 67% of Chesapeake’s drilling and completion costs until an extra $697m has been paid – expected by year-end 2014. Chesapeake is currently operating 16 wells in the two basins, with initial production rates of up to 1k barrels of oil and 3m cubic feet of natural gas per day. The companies eventually plan to develop net resource potential up to 5bn barrels of oil equivalent.

Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. has completed its previously annnounced $675m acquisition of a number of Aker Solutions’ operations within its Process and Construction (P&C) business area. Aker is retaining Aker Projects (Shanghai) Co. Ltd pending regulatory clearances in China. Aker’s P&C operations expand Jacobs’ global presence in the mining and metals market; provide a new geographic region with South America; and strengthen its presence in China.

Plasmor Ltd, the UK’s largest independent manufacturer of concrete paving, building blocks, architectural masonry and light-weight aggregate, has installed four items of Mogensen vibratory process equipment at its Heck, near Goole, manufacturing plant in 2010. The vibratory feeders, screen feeders and screens are mostly handling power station furnace bottom ash with a bulk density of ca. 1000kg/m³. Feed rates range from 20 - 180m³/h.

Ely, UK-based B&W Mechanical Handling Ltd has recently won an order to supply a model 450 Samson feeder unit to British Sugar at its Newark, UK plant. B&W has previously supplied feeders to British Sugar for a variety of applications and this latest order is its 13th installation.

BG Group has appointed AMEC to provide EPC, commissioning and project management for all of its facilities in the central North Sea. The three-year, £140m contract follows AMEC’s contract with BG for the support of the Armada asset, and triples the size of the services supplied. Projects under the new contract include implementing subsea tie backs from the Gaupe and North West Seymour wells to the Armada platform hub and a new subsea tie back to the North Everest platform hub and a feasibility study for the continued development of the Armada platform as a processing hub.

INEOS Phenol and Sinopec Yangzi Petrochemical Co. are to establish a phenol/acetone JV at the Nanjing Chemical Industrial park in Jiangsu Province, China. The unit is to leverage Sinopec’s local feedstock position and employ INEOS’ proprietary phenol technology to deliver 400ktpa of phenol and 250ktpa of acetone, and will also include 550ktpa of cumene capacity. The project is to be completed by the end of 2013.

Solvert Ltd is planning to establish a pioneering waste-to-chemicals plant in Teesside in the north east of England, at a reported cost of £100m. The process facility would be based on established ABE (acetone, butanol, ethanol) fermentation technology. Read more

Siemens VAI Metals Technologies has received an order from ThyssenKrupp Steel Europe AG to install new process-optimisation models in a continuous slab caster in the company’s Beeckerwerth steelworks in Duisburg, Germany. The process models will improve the quality of the cast slabs. The modernization of the slab caster is scheduled to be completed in the third quarter of 2011.

Exxon Mobil Corp. said its subsidiary Exxon Neftegas Ltd has drilled the “world’s longest extended-reach well” at the Odoptu field, offshore far east Russia. Exxon Neftegas is the operator of the Sakhalin-1 project on behalf of a consortium. The OP-11 well reached a depth of 12,345 meters to set a world record for extended-reach drilling (ERD). Odoptu, one of three Sakhalin-1 Project fields, is situated 8-11km offshore Sakhalin Island. ERD enables onshore drilling beneath the seafloor to offshore oil and gas reservoirs.

Severn Trent Services is to supply its Tetra NSAF (nitrifying submerged aerated filter) filtration technology to Thames Water Utilities Ltd, for the removal of tertiary ammonia down to 2 mg/l at its Standon Sewage Treatment Works. The technology’s will be supplied in a glass-coated steel tank designed for an average flow of 900m3/day and will be constructed on site in February 2011. STS has previously supplied this technology to Thames Water’s Waddesdon, Culworth and Byfield wastewater facilities.

Tullis Russell has raised productivity at its paper making, coating and converting operation following a drives and control upgrade undertaken by Optima Control Solutions Ltd to improve its Truflo coating operation. The line produces both high gloss and matt coatings to single and double sided paper. Optima designed, supplied, installed and commissioned the complete control system retrofit of a Siemens S7-400 PLC and WinCC SCADA package with Parker SSD, DC and AC drives.

EJ Bowman has supplied five exhaust gas heat exchangers for use on three CHP power plant units used for a new Eco residential village. The power plant is fueled by gas produced from a wood burner. The plot is a new residential Eco Village of 10 houses based in Finland. Units are fitted to Sisu Gensets for recovering lost heat and to cool the gas produced by the wood burner.

Mustang, a Wood Group Company, and Sime Darby’s energy & utilities division have formed a JV company, called Mustang Sime Darby. It will provide project management, design and procurement support services for the southeast Asian oil & gas industry from its regional hub in Kuala Lumpur.

In partnership with MTSA and Nedstack, Imtech has developed a technology to convert hydrogen gas released during the production of vinyl into energy at vinyl producer SolVin Antwerpen, part of Solvay Plastics. Hydrogen is first directed through a process container with fuel cells to generate DC voltage. This current is then converted into low voltage in a second process container and then sent via transformers to the SolVin energy grid. Imtech designs and integrates the entire inverter system, including the high-tech transformers and the medium voltage distribution

Imtech is supporting a project at Ensartech based on technology whereby seriously contaminated residual waste is melted under extremely high temperatures and converted into sustainable energy, without generating pollution. Work on the first Ensartech plant is due to start soon in Delfzijl. Imtech is providing all the integrated technical solutions and energy technology for this plant.

Solutia Inc. plans to expand its current Crystex insoluble sulfur operations in Kuantan, Malaysia. The expansion, it said, will double current capacity, making Solutia’s Kuantan site the largest insoluble sulfur manufacturing facility in the world.

KBR has been awarded a contract by Tianji Coal Chemical Industry Group Co. Ltd to provide licensing and related engineering services for a grassroots aniline plant to be located inLucheng, Shanxi, China. The aniline technology is offered by KBR through a licensing alliance with DuPont. KBR will license this technology, and provide basic engineering and field support services, for Tianji’s 450 metric tons per day (MTPD) aniline plant. This award follows the licensing by KBR of an existing 150,000 MTA aniline plant for Tianji in China.

Mitsubishi Corp. and Tetronics are working together on a project to treat the problematic Spent PotLiner (SPL) hazardous waste that is routinely generated during the manufacturing of aluminium. Tetronics supplies DC plasma waste recovery plants for the treatment of hazardous waste and metal recovery. SPL is generated in the primary production of aluminium and worldwide is estimated to rise at a rate of over 500,000 tonnes per year.

GL Noble Denton has signed a master service agreement with Aramco Overseas Co. BV for vendor inspection services. GL Noble Denton will inspect the manufacturing process of all types of oil and gas equipment at the vendor’s site. The contract has a validity of three years and covers services to be rendered in all European countries. Aramco expects to buy materials for approximately $5bn per year over the next five years. Vendor Inspection is a measure of quality assurance (QA) and a critical element in any pre-commissioning plans.

Nestlé has officially inaugurated a $136m manufacturing facility in Dubai to serve markets across the region.

UK manufacturer All-Fill International Ltd has selected HBM’s PW12C 75 kg capacity load cell and AD103C Analogue to Digital Convertor (A/D) card for its latest sack filling machine. This can ensure the accuracy of the machine meets the specification of up to ±0.1% of the fill weight. The machine is designed for filling 25kg sacks but All-Fill International decided it needed a bigger load cell to meet different customer specifications.

Lummus Technology has been awarded a contract by Formosa Chemicals and Fibre Corp. for the license and engineering design of a grassroots cumene and phenol plant to be built in Ningbo, China. The plant, to start up in 2013, will use Polimeri Europa/Lummus cumene and phenol technologies to produce 450ktpa of cumene and 300ktpa of phenol.

Atlas Copco Mafi-Trench LLC, USA is to acquire the pump business of J.C. Carter LLC, based in California. The company’s cryogenic submerged motor pumps are primarily used in liquid natural gas regasification and liquefaction plants, and natural gas liquid processing. In 2009 the company had around 70 employees and sales of around $25m.

Imperial Oil has released CB&I for an additional $90m of work on the Kearl oil sands project in Alberta, Canada. CB&I’s scope of work includes the EPC of a bitumen extraction unit and multiple storage tanks. Imperial contracted CB&I in early 2008 to begin front-end engineering and construction execution planning on the project and has since awarded it incremental work releases totaling around $500m, including the latest release.

Occidental Petroleum Corp. is to participate in the development of Abu Dhabi’s Shah gas field, one of the largest gas fields in the Middle East: taking a 40% stake in a 30-year contract, with Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. holding the remaining 60% interest. The project involves development of high-sulfur content reservoirs within the Shah field, located onshore about 180km SW of the city of Abu Dhabi. Read more

Metso will supply Porvoon Energia with a biomass boiler plant for combined heat and power production (CHP) in Tolkkinen, Finland. The Euro15m will be delivered by the Metso-Wärtsilä JV MW Power. Due to be ready during Q1/13, the plant will utilise bubbling fluidized bed technology, with wood chips, bark and saw dust the main fuel source. It will produce 38 MW of district heat to Porvoo area and 12 MW of electricity for the national grid.

GE has announced a joint venture between GE Energy and Shenhua Group Corp. to develop coal gasification technologies in China. This collaboration is expected to generate more than $150m in revenues over five years and $100m of US exports in services, R&D and licensing.

GE Energy and China Huadian Corp. are to develop distributed energy combined heat and power projects, which are expected to become the most efficient natural gas solutions for China. GE forecasts at least 50 gas-turbine generator sets being sold and installed in China in the next five years, resulting in $500m of revenue for the partnership and $350m in US gas turbine exports from Cincinnati, Houston, Colorado and Oregon.

Johnson Matthey has recently installed a new manufacturing process at the Clitheroe works. ACWA AIR was contracted to design, manufacture, test, install and commission a process scrubbing system for the catalysts facility. It comprises two absorber/scrubbers with associated equipment on a common skid. The system is fully automated and independently controlled through a SCADA system. Read more

DSM Engineering Plastics is to enter into two JVs with KuibyshevAzot OJSC (KA). In both, DSM will hold a majority share. In addition, while KA will be granted a license under DSM Fibre Intermediates’ technology for the production of cyclohexanone. The two JVs relate to marketing and sales of engineering plastics in Russia and the CIS and secondly for the production of engineering plastics compounds in a plant in Togliatti, Russia. The deal will also result in a license grant under DSM’s cyclohexanone technology to be applied at KA’s Togliatti caprolactam plant, resulting into a further increase of its capacity.

Celanese Corp. is to construct and operate industrial ethanol production facilities at the Nanjing Chemical Industrial Park and in Zhuhai, China. Pending project approvals, Celanese could begin industrial ethanol production within the next 30 months with an initial nameplate capacity of 400ktpa per plant with an initial investment of about $300m per plant – both using new Celanese process technology, which combines Celanese’s acetyl platform with highly advanced manufacturing technology to produce ethanol from hydrocarbon-sourced feedstocks.

Fluor Corp. has been awarded a multi-year contract extension to provide maintenance services for Luminant, a subsidiary of Energy Future Holdings Corp., including all of its fossil fuel power generation plant sites located throughout Texas. Fluor will supply supervision and craft personnel to support ongoing base crew maintenance as well as major outage and project work, construction services and plant modifications.

UK manufacturer All-Fill International Ltd has selected HBM’s PW12C 75 kg capacity load cell and AD103C Analogue to Digital Convertor (A/D) card for its latest sack filling machine. This ensures the accuracy of the machine meets the specification of up to ±0.1% of the fill weight. The machine is designed for filling 25kg sacks but All-Fill International decided it needed a bigger load cell to meet different customer specifications.

GDF SUEZ, RWE and Iberdrola have decided not to continue to participate in the Cernavoda nuclear project in Romania. Since 2008, the trio, among other international investors, have been partners with SN Nuclearelectrica for the development of units 3 and 4 of the Cernavoda power plant. RWE linked the decision to economic and market uncertainties surrounding this project, related mostly to the present financial crisis,

Foster Wheeler has been awarded a contract by Kraftanlagen Power Plants GmbH (KAP) to design, supply and erect a circulating fluidised-bed (CFB) steam generator and auxiliary equipment for the Alpiq Generating (CZ) s.r.o. Kladno Power Plant in the Czech Republic. The 135MWe CFB steam generator, located in Kladno, Czech Republic, will be designed to burn a combination of lignite and biomass. It is scheduled for the end of 2013.

Hyundai Engineering has awarded AMB-Hertel a contract to design, supply and erect all the access scaffolding during the construction of the $1.7bn utilities and offsites project at Abu Dhabi Gas Industries (Gasco) new Integrated gas development (IGD). The two-year contract covers the design and erection of around 150,000m3 of scaffolding access at the Habshan site.

Santos Ltd has awarded Fluor Corp. an EPC contract for its Gladstone LNG project in Queensland, Australia. Fluor’s EPC contract includes upstream facilities associated with the 7800ktpa LNG project that will extract and liquefy gas from coal deposits for export to Asia and other global markets. Fluor booked $3.5bn for the contract. Fluor was previously awarded the upstream FEED contract in 2009 by Santos for the GLNG project and the early works contract in May 2010.

Honeywell has a new contract with Sasol Solvents Germany to upgrade the DCS and PLC systems at its gas-fired power plant in Moers, Germany. The upgrades, which include the installation of Experion Process Knowledge System (PKS) and Safety Manager, are part of a nine-month project that will see Honeywell’s process solutions become standardised throughout the site. Read more

INEOS Chlor has reduced process variability by 5% at its Runcorn chlor-alkali and chlorine derivatives plant by replacing traditional butterfly valves with Fisher Control-Disk valves. The tighter control has increased plant throughput and avoided several unplanned shutdowns that could have cost as much as Euro450k, reports supplier Emerson. Read more

Alcoa and China Power Investment Corp. (CPI) have agreed to collaborate on a range of aluminum and energy projects representing over $7.5bn of potential investment over the coming years. In China, Alcoa and CPI will intensify their collaboration on developing clean energy projects such as wind and solar and aluminum smelting operations, as well as high-end aluminum industrial parks. Outside China, CPI and Alcoa will explore projects, including mining, refining, smelting and energy, in different regions.

Bechtel has turned over the Oak Creek power plant expansion project in Oak Creek, Wisconsin to the plant operator, Wisconsin Electric Power Co. The plant is now one of the most efficient coal-fired power plants in the US. The expansion, which broke ground in 2005, involved constructing two 615MW coal-fired generating units. Unit 1 was turned over on 2 Feb, 2010; Unit 2 on 12 Jan, 2011.

BP has been awarded four deepwater offshore blocks in the Ceduna Sub Basin within the Great Australian Bight, off the coast of South Australia. BP will explore Exploration Permit for Petroleum (EPP) areas EPP 37, EPP 38, EPP 39 and EPP 40 covering an area of 24,000 km2 for oil and gas reserves, with the right to develop any commercially viable discoveries. The proposed exploration activity would be phased over six years, subject to detailed environmental assessment.

Rosneft and BP have agreed to explore and develop three license blocks - EPNZ 1,2,3 - on the Russian Arctic continental shelf. These licences were awarded to Rosneft in 2010 and cover an area of about 125,000 square km in the South Kara Sea – an area roughly equivalent in size and prospectivity to the UK North Sea. Read more

Total has acquired interests in four six-year, exploration licenses in the Neuquén Basin, Argentina, with YPF - a 42.5% stake in both the Aguada de Castro and Pampa las Yeguas II licenses, which Total will operate; and a 40% stake in the Cerro Las Minas license and a 45% interest in the Cerro Partido license to be operated by YPF - in order to appraise their shale gas potential. Total already has significant shale gas-related holdings in Argentina.

Foster Wheeler has won a contract with Ingeteam Power Plants SA to design, supply and erect a bubbling fluidised-bed (BFB) steam generator and auxiliary equipment for Biomasa de Cantabria, which is majority-owned by the Armando Álvarez Group.The BFB unit, to be integrated into a power plant being constructed at Reocin in Cantabria, Spain, will burn residual biomass from nearby logging operations. The steam produced will be used for electricity generation. Commercial startup is due in Q4/12.

GDM (Heat Transfer) Ltd has designed and manufactured a bespoke set of combination coolers for container-based diesel engines. The recently delivered order, requested at the end of 2010 by an unnamed customer, involved challenging requirements as the units had to handle varying ambient temperatures dependent in various location and working conditions.

ThermaSys Corp., a US manufacturer of copper, brass and aluminum heat exchanger components and assemblies, has acquired Covrad Holdings and Serck Heat Transfer. The two UK-based heat transfer product makers produce radiators, charged air coolers, and oil coolers for OEM and aftermarket customers in the power generation, rail, marine, and transportation sectors worldwide.

Boiled sweets maker Joseph Dobson, based in Elland, West Yorkshire, has doubled output, reduced man hours by 50% and cut energy costs following the installation of two Thorite air compressors. One unit is used to provide forced air to a triple linear form, fill & seal (FFS) line, which packs hard boilings into cast polypropylene bags. The second compressor powers another packing line, handling new products for the pharma industry by feeding 10 multi-head weigh/FFS systems.

Aggreko has provided power for First Hydro to test a newly manufactured generator stator at the Ffestiniog plant in the Snowdonia region of Wales. First Hydro is part of a JV between International Power plc and Mitsui & Co. Ltd, and this work is part of a planned refurbishment at the power station. Ffestiniog’s four AEI-manufactured generating units, each coupled with turbines and pumps, are located below the Moelwyn mountains and produce 360 MW of electricity from the Stwlan reservoir.

INEOS has agreed to partner with PetroChina in new trading and refining joint ventures related to the UK group’s refining operations in Grangemouth, Scotland and Lavéra, France. INEOS has also signed a deal to share refining and petrochemical technology with PetroChina’s parent group China National Petroleum Corp. Read more

Samsung Engineering has signed a $411m for a chlor-alkali plant with Dow-Mitsui Chlor-Alkali LLC, a JV between Dow Chemical Co. and Mitsui Chemicals. The chlor-alkali plant in Freeport, Texas and will produce 816ktpa of chlorine – the world’s largest chlorine production facilities. The lump-sum turn-key contract is for EPC services and is scheduled for mechanical completion by January 2013.

The recently opened Glenmorangie bottling plant in Livingston, Scotland, has commissioned a product recovery installation from Cheshire-based Aeolus Technologies. Project engineers from Allen Associates who designed the new whisky plant in conjunction with Glenmorangie incorporated the Whirlwind System into the pipe clearing process. Read more

IMV Projects, a Wood Group company, has a multimillion dollar contract with AltaGas to provide full EPCM services for the C$235MM Gordondale sour gas processing facility and associated gas gathering system. The facility is to process 120m cubic feet/day and will include deep cut liquids extraction capabilities to recover the natural gas liquids before the gas enters the sales gas pipeline. It will be located approx. 100km NW of Grande Prairie, in the Gordondale area of the Montney shale gas play, and is due on-stream by Q4/12.

Shanks has gained planning permission for its second AD facility in the UK. The £11 million, 48ktpa facility will generate up to 2MW of renewable energy, enough to power around 2000 homes. Read more

The worldwide market for process field Instruments, such as key pressure, temperature, flow and level devices, will grow at an average annual rate of about 5% from 2010-15, forceasts the Global Foresight Group. Process field instruments include all . In 2010, North America accounted for about 30% of the total market, with the EU at 23%. BRIC countries made up 19% of demand, but will provide the highest growth rates to 2015: continuing the decline of the N America and EU market shares.