Aibel gears up for Njord Bravo upgrade

Norwegian oilfield services provider Aibel is preparing for the project of refurbishment and lifetime extension of the floating storage unit (FSU) Njord Bravo, following a successful operation of getting it into the dock in Haugesund.

Aibel won the upgrade contract from Equinor, then Statoil, back in April 2018. The contract is worth about NOK 1.3 billion.

Last week, Njord Bravo left Kristiansund and started its journey to Aibel’s yard in Haugesund.

On Friday evening, the vessel arrived in Haugesund, and after the scheduled preparations, the operation of bringing the vessel into dock began early Saturday morning.

A large FSU like Njord Bravo requires assistance from a lot of smaller boats in front to keep it in position, togboats on the sides, and a large winch to pull the vessel safely into the dock, Aibel explained on Tuesday in a statement announcing the vessel’s arrival.

“I’m very pleased with the way we completed the docking. We’ve been preparing for this operation for a while and had great focus on safety. Everyone were confident and knew exactly what to do when we started,” says project manager in Aibel, Håkon Falnes.

Many operations will be carried out in the dock during the summer and autumn. Aibel will start by washing down the outside of Njord Bravo and ensuring access to all work areas. After that, Aibel can start the main work, which includes a lot of preparation for installation as well as surface treatment of tanks and the hull.

According to the plan, Njord Bravo will leave the dry dock and be moved to the rig quay at Aibel in early 2019. Here, Aibel will complete the work before hand-over to Equinor during the spring of 2020.

Njord is an oil and gas field in the Norwegian Sea, located around 30 kilometers west of Draugen. The field development consisted of a floating steel platform with a drilling and processing facility, Njord A, and a floating storage and offloading (FSO) vessel, Njord Bravo. First oil was in 1997.

The storage vessel will be prepared for extended operation of the Njord and Hyme fields, as well as tie-in of two new field developments in the Norwegian Sea, Bauge and Fenja.