MODEC gets its hands on 20-year FPSO job with Shell for Brazilian oil & gas development

Shortly after disclosing a final investment decision (FID) for its deepwater development project in the pre-salt area of the Santos Basin off the coast of Brazil, Shell do Brasil, a Brazilian subsidiary of the UK-headquartered energy giant Shell, has handed out a multi-year operations and maintenance assignment to Japan’s MODEC for a floating production, storage, and offloading (FPSO) vessel destined to work on this project in Brazilian waters.

A little over a year after Shell postponed the FID for its Gato do Mato project in November 2022, explaining that it did not expect to make it within 12 to 24 months, Cristiano da Costa, President of Shell Brasil, said the company was planning to take the final investment decision for the project in 1Q 2025.

To this end, MODEC was picked to handle the hull design and all related topside facilities for an FPSO unit destined to work on the project. Shell adhered to its disclosed timeline and took the FID for the Gato do Mato deepwater project on March 21, 2025.  

In the aftermath of the front-end engineering design (FEED) contract, which was awarded a year ago, MODEC has signed a purchase and sales agreement and a contract for the operations and maintenance of the FPSO for 20 years with the UK-headquartered supermajor.

According to the Japanese player, the FPSO Gato do Mato will sport a new-built, custom-made next-generation hull to meet the 25-year design life. This will be the firm’s 19th FPSO to be developed for Brazil and the second unit to be delivered directly to Shell for operation in Brazilian waters.

Once installed, the FPSO Gato do Mato, which will be capable of producing 120,000 barrels of oil per day (bopd) and associated gas and water, will be moored at a water depth of approximately 2,000 meters, around 200 kilometers south of Rio de Janeiro.

MODEC has confirmed that it will be responsible for the design of the hull and all related topsides facilities for the FPSO, which will be moored by a SOFEC spread mooring system. The produced stabilized crude is set to be stored in the FPSO tanks with the oil to be offloaded to shuttle tankers to go to market.

The Gato do Mato consortium encompasses Shell (operator with a 50% stake), Ecopetrol (30%), TotalEnergies (20%), and Pré-Sal Petróleo SA (PPSA) acting as manager of the production sharing contract (PSC). This deepwater project is scheduled to come into operation in 2029.

The Gato do Mato pre-salt gas-condensate discovery, in water depths ranging from 1,750 to 2,050 meters, spans two contiguous blocks: BM-S-54, a concession contract signed in 2005, and Sul de Gato do Mato, a production sharing contract (PSC) obtained in 2017.

Shell is currently busy with many projects in its global portfolio, including contemplating drilling activities in an ultra-deepwater block in South Africa near the maritime boundary with Namibia while analyzing data from the nine wells drilled so far at PEL 39, where the firm recently wrote down $400 million.

MODEC is also involved in multiple projects, as illustrated by a recent construction milestone for another FPSO, which will work on an upcoming project off the coast of Brazil.