Brazil: Christening Ceremony for Petrobras P-56 Rig

The christening ceremony for platform P-56 will be held today (Friday, June 3), at the BrasFELS Shipyard, in Angra dos Reis (state of Rio de Janeiro). With capacity to process 100,000 barrels of oil and to compress 6 million cubic meters of gas per day, the P-56 will operate in Marlim Sul Field development Module 3, in the Campos Basin, Rio de Janeiro.

The president of Brazil, Dilma Rousseff, and Petrobras’ CEO, José Sergio Gabrielli de Azevedo, will attend the event.

Petrobras’ directors for Exploration and Production, Guilherme Estrella; Downstream, Paulo Roberto Costa; Gas & Energy, Graça Foster; Services’ interim director, Roberto Gonçalves; International’ interim director, Fernando Cunha, and the presidents of Petrobras Distribuidora, José Lima de Andrade Neto, and Transpetro, Sergio Machado will also take part in the ceremony.

A semi-submersible unit, the P-56 will be anchored at a depth of 1,670 meters and interconnected to 21 wells, including ten oil production wells and 11 water injectors. Identical to platform P-51, the new unit is part of the Federal Government’s Growth Acceleration Program (GAP) and is considered a milestone in the Brazilian naval industry, since it consolidates Brazil’s capacity to build platforms of this size. The new platform’s topside (integrated modules) attained a domestic content index of 72.9%, and the hull was built entirely in Brazil, showing how orders placed by Petrobras are strengthening the Brazilian shipbuilding.

 

Petrobras and FSTP, a consortium set up by Keppel FELS and Technip, signed the construction agreement for the platform in October 2007. Some US$1.5 billion were invested in its construction, and the project created 4,000 direct and 12,000 indirect jobs in Brazil. Final construction operations on the platform will be completed from June and it will undergo the testing and final adjustment phases at the Ilha Grande Bay, in Angra dos Reis, and then be tugged to the Campos Basin for anchoring and well interconnection. Production is slated to begin in the Marlim Sul Field in August.

Modular construction

The P-56’s modular construction comprises the deckbox and hull modules. Keppel FELS assembled the four process and utilities modules at the BrasFELS shipyard. The two power generation modules were built by Rolls Royce in association with UTC Engenharia at UTC’s site in Niterói. The two compression modules were built by Nouvo Pignone (General Electric) at the Porto Novo Rio site in Rio de Janeiro. The deckbox was also built at BrasFELS, where the modules were integrated. After integration, the assembled component is known as the topside.

The new platform’s hull is entirely Brazilian. It was built at the BrasFELS shipyard by joining the steel modules fabricated by the shipyard itself and by Nuclep, in Itaguaí. The highly complex process of joining the hull to the topside, called deck mating, was carried out smoothly in October 2010.

P-56 Specifications

Location: Marlim Sul field, 120 Km off the coast

Oil production: 100,000 barrels of oil per day

Gas compression: 6 million cubic meters per day

Power generation: 100 MW

Anchoring depth: 1,670 m

Length 125 m width 110 m height 137 m

Living quarters: 200 people

Total weight: 54,658 tons

Production wells: 10

Injection wells: 11

Risers: 79

Oil offloading: pipeline to P-38 (approx. 20 km)

Natural gas offloading, gas pipeline to P-51 (approx.15 km)

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Source: Petrobras, June 3, 2011;