Angola’s largest independent oil & gas producer goes on a hat-trick award spree 

Eni Angola, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Azule Energy, has awarded Malaysian FPSO operator Yinson with a contract to deliver a floating, production, storage and offloading (FPSO) asset for the Agogo field development located offshore Angola.

Under the firm contract, Yinson will provide, operate and maintain the FPSO for the Agogo Integrated West Hub Development Project, which is expected to commence operations in the fourth quarter of 2025.

The contract has an estimated aggregate value of approximately $5.3 billion and a firm period of 15 years from the date of the final acceptance, with the option to extend for a further five years.

The firm contract follows the signing of an Agreement for Preliminary Activities on 2 December 2022 between the parties.

“We have been operating in the African region since 1995, and this is a vital market to us,” said Yinson’s CEO Flemming Grønnegaard. “We are committed to delivering value-added results for our client, whilst implementing a low emission design that helps to mitigate climate change. Together, we hope to pioneer some sustainable technologies such as carbon capture that we believe can pave the way for the decarbonisation of the FPSO industry.”

Yinson said that FPSO Agogo will be its first offshore production project in Angola and the company’s eighth FPSO project in the West African region and will increase its total order book to approximately $22.4 billion.

Eni Angola has also awarded two other contracts for the Agogo project, concerning subsea equipment. Namely, Aker Solutions was appointed to provide the umbilicals for the development located in the West Hub Area of Block 15/06.

The contract includes the engineering, manufacturing and delivery of a complete umbilical system totaling about 36 kilometers of both dynamic and static subsea production control umbilicals including spares, as well as ancillary equipment and services.

The umbilicals will be manufactured at the company’s site in Moss, Norway. Work starts immediately and is planned to be delivered in the second quarter of 2024.

Furthermore, Subsea 7 won a contract for the transport and installation of approximately 98 kilometers of flexible pipes, 30 kilometers of umbilical, and associated subsea structures in water depths of around 1,700 meters.

Project management and engineering have already commenced and will be managed from Subsea 7’s offices in Angola, France, UK and Portugal.

Fabrication will take place at the Sonamet yard in Lobito, with offshore operations planned between Q4 2024 and Q4 2025.

Aker Solutions’ contract is said to be worth between NOK 0.5 billion and NOK 1.5 billion (approximately between $48.3 million and $145 million), and Subsea 7’s between $300 million and $500 million.

Adriano Mongini, Azule Energy CEO, said: “This is a key milestone for Azule Energy. Agogo marks the start of a new wave of major investments in Angola’s deep water oil production. With the right partnerships, we trust that this project will be delivered in a safe and efficient manner bringing significant value of activities for the country oil and gas industry.”

Azule Energy was established in August last year as a 50/50 joint venture between BP and Eni through the combination of the companies’ Angolan businesses. The new company is said to be Angola’s largest producer.