Transocean Ltd. has announced that it has been awarded four drillship contracts by Royal Dutch Shell. The 10-year contracts are for newbuild dynamically positioned ultra-deepwater drillships. The first drillship’s shipyard delivery is scheduled for 2015. The remaining three drillships are expected to be delivered from the shipyard at approximately six-month intervals after that.
Each of the drillships is designed to operate in water depths of up to 12,000 feet and drill wells to 40,000 feet. They feature state-of-the-art equipment, including Transocean’s patented dual-activity drilling technology. They will also have a variable deckload capacity of 23,000 metric tons and feature enhanced well completion capabilities.
“These contracts add 40 years of rig work to our revenue backlog, expand and upgrade our ultra-deepwater fleet, improve our fleet mix and provide an opportunity to expand our relationship with an important customer with which we have 40 years of experience in advancing the state of the art in offshore drilling technology,” said President and Chief Executive Officer of Transocean Ltd, Steven L. Newman. “We look forward to providing Shell with incremental value through the addition of these seventh-generation, ultra-deepwater drillships.”
The newbuild rigs will be constructed at the Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering Co., Ltd. facility at Okpo, South Korea. Construction on the first drillship is expected to start late 2013.
“Shell continues to develop its deepwater operations and modernize its contracted rig fleet at fair market rates. These state-of-the-art deepwater rigs, on which we are collaborating with Transocean to design, will comply with the highest industry standards for safety, operations and environmental protection for drilling deepwater wells,” said Shell’s Executive Vice President, Wells, Peter Sharpe.
