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Shtokman moving forward on all fronts
Sarah Hurst For Petroleum News
French oil major Total, which reported a net profit of 12.2 billion euros ($18.9 billion) in 2007, will use its cash to fund new large-scale projects such as Shtokman, the company’s CEO Christophe de Margerie said at a shareholder meeting May 16. Total owns a 25 percent stake in Shtokman to develop the $15 billion first stage of the project, with Gazprom holding 51 percent and Norway’s StatoilHydro the remaining 24 percent.
UK-based Converteam, which specializes in power conversion, has secured an order to supply power optimization solutions for two offshore semi-submersible drilling rigs from Vyborg Shipyard in Russia and Samsung Heavy Industries in Korea, the company announced in a release May 1. Converteam will provide power, propulsion, distribution, vessel automation and thruster-assisted mooring systems to the first two CS-50 ice class rigs for the Shtokman natural gas field.
Support base at Novaya Zemlya Russian construction company Arktikstroy and Gazprom plan to build a support base for the Shtokman project in the Novaya Zemlya archipelago, Regnum.ru reported in mid-May. Novaya Zemlya is situated between the Barents Sea and the Kara Sea and is famous for being the site of 132 nuclear tests. It is still a closed military area. The archipelago has an airfield, five moorages and other necessary infrastructure, according to the head of Arktikstroy, Sergei Khromtsov. Construction of the base could start in about 18 months, he estimated.
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