Saudis Award Gas Job to India-UK Duo

Saudi Aramco has awarded a contract for three gas production deck modules to the LTHE consortium of Mumbai-based Larsen & Toubro (L&T) and London-based Subsea7, L&T announced April 5.

Its statement said this was the fourth award for LTHE, and that three offshore contracts are currently under execution by LTHE for Saudi Aramco under a long term agreement. No contract value was provided. 

L&T said the latest award consists of engineering, procurement, fabrication, transportation, installation and commissioning of three gas production decks with a high integrity protection systems and exotic materials that will protect the plant for a life of 50 years and more. Two of the decks will be installed at the offshore Hasbah gas field and one at the Arabiyah field, both sour gas fields operated by Saudi Aramco.

Aramco began producing gas from Hasbah in March 2016.  Some of its gas will go to a giant Engie-managed 1.5 GW combined-cycle gas-fired power plant due to start operating late 2019.

Aramco says on its website that more than 40% of its non-associated gas now comes from offshore fields such as Hasbah, which feeds its Wasit Gas Plant, and that increasing gas production helps the country reduce its reliance on liquid fuels for power generation, freeing up more oil for export. Last year Aramco CEO Amin Nasser outlined Aramco's goal of doubling gas output over the coming decade to 23bn ft³/d.

Elsewhere in the Middle East, Austria's OMV said April 5 that it had been agreed with Abu Dhabi's state Adnoc that OMV will acquire a 20% interest in the concession for the offshore oil fields Satah Al Razboot (with the satellite fields Bin Nasher and Al Bateel) and Umm Lulu, as well as associated infrastructure, for a purchase price of $1.5bn. Final signing is expected late April 2018.