Norwegian duo picks up Johan Sverdrup Phase 2 prize

A 50/50 joint venture between Aker Solutions and Kvaerner has been awarded a letter of intent with Statoil for modifications of the riser platform and the field center for the Johan Sverdrup development, Norway’s largest oil find in more than three decades.

The contract value is NOK 3.4 billion ($434.6M) and will be split equally between the two companies, which formed a joint venture to carry out the work for the second phase of the North Sea development. At peak, this is estimated to involve about 2,000 employees at both businesses and their sub-suppliers.

The work includes engineering, procurement, construction and installation of a utility module for the riser platform that will help boost production from the field to 660,000 barrels of oil equivalents a day. It also entails modifications of the field center and integration of a second processing platform to the center. The work will start in the second quarter of 2018 and will be completed in 2022.

Construction at Stord

The module will be constructed at Kvaerner’s specialized facilities at Stord, Norway. For Kvaerner, the peak manning on the project will be around 550 people. For Aker Solutions, the work will involve more than 450 employees in Stavanger, Egersund and offshore Norway.

Aker Solutions earlier this year completed front-end engineering and design (FEED) for phase two of the development, including for the module and work to integrate this with the riser platform. The FEED work was secured last year as part of a 10-year framework engineering agreement for Johan Sverdrup that was awarded to Aker Solutions in 2013.

Kvaerner has been involved in the development since 2014, delivering the utility and living quarter topsides, the three largest and most complex steel jacket substructures as well as offshore hook-up of the riser platform together with Aker Solutions.

Johan Sverdrup is estimated to hold 2.1 billion to 3.1 billion barrels of oil equivalents. It is expected to produce up to 660,000 barrels of oil equivalents a day when fully developed in 2022, equal to about a quarter of current domestic output.

Production is slated to start in late 2019 and is predicted to last for about 50 years. Statoil is operator for the development, which spans three licenses. Other partners include Lundin Norway, Petoro, Maersk Oil and Aker BP.