Top-Draw performances by Dutch Suppliers

Recession or no recession, the Dutch suppliers to the offshore wind energy, dredging and oil and gas sector have repeatedly succeeded in developing top-draw products and delivering topflight performances. Several hundred companies including yards, shipping operators, soil surveyors and design firms have successfully delivered tailor-made solutions for the entire nautical sector. An overview.

Although operating in a difficult market the Dutch offshore construction yards once again succeeded in handing over a number of platforms in 2017, as well as winning a series of new fabrication orders. Much of this work was undertaken by the various yards of the Heerema Fabrication Group. For example, the Heerema yard in Zwijndrecht completed the jacket and topside module for the Oseberg Vestflanken 2 project for Statoil in June 2017. Both platform parts, with a total weight of 4,400 tonnes, were subsequently installed in the Norwegian sector of the North Sea, by Heerema Marine Contractor’s semi-submersible crane vessel Hermod. During the same

period, the Heerema yard in Flushing watched the sailaway of the jackets for the Culzean utility and living quarters platform and the central processing facility platform, weighing 6,800 and 8,000 tonnes respectively. Both structures were built on the basis of so-called EPC contracts. Shortly after fabrication was started at the yard in Flushing of the 135 metre-high eight-leg jacket weighing 9300 tonnes and 12 piles for the Peregrino 2 project currently being undertaken by Statoil, off the coast of Brazil. This giant jacket is due to be handed over in October 2019. Other new orders for the Heerema Fabrication Group include the fabrication of a transformer

module intended for the Albatros Offshore Wind Farm, four normally unmanned installation platforms for IOG’s Southern North Sea gas projects, otherwise known as the Blythe Hub and Vulcan Satellites Hub developments, a vent boom for the Leviathan project for Noble Energy in the Mediterranean and the unmanned gas production platform Q10-A that Tulip Oil aims to install in the Dutch sector of the North Sea.

Substations At the HSM Offshore yard in Schiedam the sail-away of the L13-FI-1 monotower platform for NAM took place on 5 May 2017. The platform was designed by Iv-Oil&Gas, while the installation in the Dutch sector of the North Sea was carried out by the crane vessel Rambiz operated by Scaldis Salvage & Marine Contractors. Much work was also completed at the same yard during the course of 2017 on the jacket and topsides for the substation of the Borkum Riffgrund 2 Offshore Wind Farm. Handover is planned for May 2018. This platform was also designed by Iv-Oil&Gas. Elsewhere, HSM Offshore signed contracts for the fabrication of the transformer platforms for the Borssele Alpha and Borssele Bèta projects that are planned for completion in 2019 and 2020.

At the ENGIE Fabricom and Iemants consortium, substations for offshore wind farms in Western Europe are constantly rolling off the production line. In 2016 and 2017 for example, the jackets and topsides were delivered for Burbo Bank, Racebank 2, Racebank 1, Walney 3, Walney 4 and Merkur. The jackets for these platforms were fabricated in Ridderkerk and Flushing, in the Netherlands, while the topsides were built in Hoboken, Belgium.

Ship repair 30 June 2017 saw the announcement that Damen Shiprepair Conversion had taken over the worldrenowned Keppel Verolme offshore and ship repair yard from Keppel Offshore & Marine in Singapore. The yard, that employs a staff of 250, will continue to operate under the name Damen Verolme Rotterdam. During the course of 2017 maintenance and repair work was undertaken at the yard on the semi-submersible crane vessel Saipem 7000, the diving-support vessel Seawell, the FPSOs Armada Kraken and Western Isles and the semi-submersible accommodation platform Floatel Endurance. The upgrade of Teekay’s FPSO Petrojarl 1 was concluded at Damen Shiprepair Rotterdam in August 2017. Subsequently, in

2018 an upgrade was carried out on the wind turbine installation vessel Aeolus, operated by Van Oord. The upgrade included the replacement of the old 900- tonne crane with a new Huisman crane with a lifting capacity of 1600 tonnes. The accommodation was also expanded, the deck strengthened, sponsons were installed and the spudcans enlarged. In December the jack-up drilling rig Prospector 5 sailed into the yard in Schiedam for a maintenance inspection. At Damen Shiprepair Flushing, maintenance work was carried out on the wind turbine installation vessel Vole Au Vent and the jack-up drilling rig Ensco 122.

Having previously built eight highly advanced pipelaying vessels for Subsea 7, Royal IHC received a new order from the same British diving company in October 2017, this time for the design and fabrication of a new reel-lay vessel and associated pipelay equipment. This state-ofthe-art offshore support vessel will be handed over at the start of 2020. In the month of October Royal IHC also announced acquisition of a 50 percent interest in the Rotterdam Offshore Group to strengthen its ship repair and conversion capabilities. The ROG yard has uninterrupted access to open sea.

Ship new building In 2017 the Damen Shipyards Group above all stole the limelight with a series of new building projects. One special handover involved the large service operation vessel Bibby Wavemaster 1 for Bibby Marine Services Limited. Shortly prior to handover, in August, two new contracts were signed for the deployment of this vessel in the offshore wind energy sector and oil and gas industry. Another special event was the handover of four platform supply vessels of the new type Damen PSV 5000 to Atlantic Towing in Canada. The vessels in question were the Paul A. Sacuta, Atlantic Griffon, Atlantic Shrike and Atlantic Heron. Various Damen new building yards once again completed an impressive series of new tugs of different types, for operators in Ireland, Western Australia, Abu Dhabi, England, French Guyana, Italy and the United States. In addition, two so-called Fast Crew Suppliers 3307 were delivered to the government of Nigeria. A whole series of new build orders were signed up, including orders for two Damen ASD Tugs 2913 for deployment in Panama, six Damen ART 85-32W rotor tugs for operations in Australia and an ASD Tug 2913 for use in the United Arab Emirates. Together with Saam Smit Towage, a build contract was also signed for a

Damen ASD Tug 2411 while Smit Lamnalco ordered four Damen ASD Tugs 3212 for new terminal contracts in Australia and Oman. CombiLift from Germany came with a spectacular order in June 2017 for the construction of no less than 19 workboats, including so-called multicats, pusher tugs, stan pontoons and side floaters to be used on Gazprom’s Amur Gas Processing Plant project in the Far East of Russia.

Engineers Dutch design and engineering companies have established a fabulous worldwide reputation over the years. One of the best-known companies is GustoMSC, which in 2017 presented the design for its latest NG series self-propelled jack-up. This NG-5500X-LD design is suitable for light drilling and well intervention work in mature fields. The same firm went on to present the NG-20000X jack-up with telescopic leg crane designed to handle the ever larger offshore wind turbine components. This self-propelled jack-up can be used for installing the next generation wind turbine components and foundations.

Earlier in the year, GustoMSC had produced the Cat-J jack-up drilling rig design, on the basis of which the Samsung yard in South Korea fabricated the rigs Askeladden and Askepot in 2017. This pair, both of the type CJ70-X150-STCAT-J, are the largest jackup drilling rigs in the world and will be deployed by Statoil in Norwegian waters. For the installation of wind turbines in American waters GustoMSC also came up with the SEA-3250-LT installation jack-up design. Vuyk Engineering Rotterdam was responsible for designing

the new crane vessel Gulliver soon to be handed over to Scaldis Salvage & Marine Contractors by Royal IHC. A design was also produced for the conversion of the heavy-transport vessel Finesse into a dp heavy-lift crane vessel Bokalift 1, equipped with a 3,000-tonne Huisman crane. Ulstein Design and Solutions based in Rotterdam were responsible for the design of the new LNG powered dp2 heavy-lift crane vessel for Jumbo Shipping, which when completed will be the largest X-bow vessel in the world. In January 2018 Royal IHC announced that it had taken over the engineering and consultancy bureau KCI.

Offshore Ship Designers based in IJmuiden introduced a new design for a fuel-efficient harbour tug as part of its expanding Azistern portfolio. This Azistern 2870 design comprises a modern tug with a bollard pull of 70 tonnes. Finally, Huisman announced that ABS had approved the HuisDrill 12000 drillship design in May 2017. Huisman had prepared this design for drilling contractor Diamond Offshore, who subsequently rechristened the concept to Floating Factory, a highly automated next generation drillship.

FPSO operators In July 2017 SBM Offshore based in Amsterdam, the world’s largest supplier of FPSOs, sold the new Turritella FPSO for 1 billion dollars to Shell E&P Offshore Services, who deploys the vessel in the Stones field in the Gulf of Mexico. The company also signed a new build contract with a yard in China for the construction of the first hull for the new standard Fast4Ward FPSO type. Statoil awarded SBM Offshore the contract for the design and delivery of a large-scale turret mooring for the Johan Castberg FPSO project. The construction work was entrusted to Drydocks World in Dubai. SBM Offshore also signed a contract with Keppel Shipyard in Singapore for the conversion of a VLCC into an FPSO. The converted FPSO will see service off the coast of Guyana, in the Liza oil field, on behalf of ExxonMobil.

Bluewater Energy Systems based in Hoofddorp received permission to deploy the FPSO Aoka Mizu as early production system in the Lancaster field in the British sector of the North Sea. Prior to starting work, the FPSO will be converted at Drydocks World in Dubai. The bare boat charter contract for Bluewater’s FPSO Bleo Holm was also extended by Repsol Sinopec Resources UK. This FPSO is in use exploring for oil from the British Ross and Blake fields in the North Sea.

New vessels Just like in previous years a number of new vessels were added to the fleet of Den Helder-based Vroon Offshore Services in 2017. The new additions include the ultramodern dp subsea support walk-to-work vessels VOS Start and VOS Stone, both built at the Fujian Southeast yard in China. The VOS Start was the first to arrive in the Netherlands, for outfitting at the Damen Oranje yard in Amsterdam with a Barge Master gangway system and an SMST heave compensated 50-tonne crane. The first charterer for this new vessel was MHI Vestas Offshore Wind for offshore logistic support, accommodation and walk-to-work services during the construction of the Walney Extension Offshore Wind Farm operated by DONG Energy in the Irish Sea. The VOS Stone also visited the Damen Oranje yard for alterations, which included equipping the ship with an Ampelmann gangway. E.On subsequently chartered the vessel for use in the construction of the Arkona Offshore Wind Farm. The VOS Stone will soon also be deployed at the same windfarm, on behalf of VBMS. In 2017 Vroon Offshore Services also took delivery of the platform supply vessels VOS Passion and VOS

Patience, numbers four and five in a series of six platform supply vessels of the type Ulstein PX121, with an X-bow. Number six, the VOS Patriot, will be completed in 2018. The first charter for the VOS Passion involved a cargo run for HMC, from Flushing to Stavanger. Later in the year, the ship carried out supply work at the DolWin alpha & gamma transformer platforms. In the second half of 2017 Technip chartered both the VOS Patience and the VOS Partner for deployment in the Bahr Essalam field off the coast of Libya.

Wagenborg Offshore signed a contract with NAM and Shell UK for the deployment of a second walk-to-work/ emergency response vessel in the southern section of the North Sea. This vessel will work as a standby and support vessel for inspection and maintenance of unmanned platforms in both Dutch and British waters. The platform supply vessel Blue Ocean was purchased to fulfil this contract. The Blue Ocean is a supplier of the type Ulstein PX121, the conversion work on which was undertaken at the Royal Niestern Sander yard in Delfzijl. The vessel is planned for commissioning in March 2018. Wagenborg Offshore is also involved in similar projects in the southern

section of the North Sea, on behalf of NAM and Shell UK, with its walk-to-work vessel Kroonborg.

In 2018 Acta Marine from Den Helder will be launching a dp walk-to-work construction support vessel, the Acta Auriga. This vessel of the type Ulstein SX195 is equipped both with an X-stern and X-bow. Acta Marine has already succeeded in signing a two-year charter contract with Ocean Breeze Energy for the Acta Auriga, for deployment in the Bard 1 Offshore Wind Farm, even before the vessel has been handed over by the Ulstein yard. The Acta Auriga will be equipped with SMST mission equipment, consisting of a motion compensated gangway and a 6-tonne 3D crane. Leidschendam-based Fugro set to work with a number of new survey vessels, including the Fugro Venturer, Fugro Aquarius, Southern Star and Kobi Ruegg, all of which were immediately deployed at a variety of projects around the world. The Rem Etive, previously chartered by Fugro, was finally purchased in 2017, rechristened the Fugro Etive and immediately deployed on a two-year IRM contract. The charter contract for the construction vessel Skandi Carla was extended for a further two years by Fugro.

Suppliers One supplier that regularly hit the headlines in 2017 with innovative products was Ampelmann, based in Delft. The eye-catching projects included the Ampelmann E 1000 motion compensated access system with a gangway which transforms into a crane boom. Another new Ampelmann project was the Icemann, a special gangway system for use in extremely cold conditions. The first Icemann was installed on board the Russian platform standby vessel Stephan Makarov. This vessel is currently at work in the Sakhalin 2 field on behalf of Sakhalin Energy. Ampelmann also presented a new A-type and S-type gangway system.

SMST from Drachten built a telescopic access bridge of the M-series, including flattrack and telescopic pedestal elevator system for Van Oord’s wind turbine installation vessel Aeolus. For Esvagt’s new offshore support vessel SMST also supplied an access and cargo tower system, as well as a telescopic access bridge from the M-series for Jumbo Shipping’s Fairplayer. Finally, Schiedam-based Huisman developed an innovative fibre rope crane with active heave compensation. A 120-tonne and 200-tonne version are available, in a knuckle boom crane design n

Load-out of the two Culzean jackets at the Heerema yard in Flushing. (Photograph: PAS Publicaties/maritimephoto.com)

Sail-away of one of the substations for the Racebank Offshore Wind Farm.(Photograph: PAS Publicaties/maritimephoto.com)

In 2017 the Damen Shipyards Group handed over the service operations vessel Bibby Wavemaster 1. (Photograph: PAS Publicaties)

In 2017 Vroon Offshore Services took delivery of the platform supply vessel VOS Passion. (Photograph: PAS Publicaties)