Breagh Development: RWE Dea Awards Pipelay Contract to Allseas (UK)

RWE Dea UK announced today that the contract for the engineering, installation and pre-commissioning of the offshore pipeline, and associated fibre optic cable, for the Breagh Development has been awarded to Allseas Construction Contractors SA (“Allseas”).

Allseas will perform the required detailed design engineering and will lay the approximately 100 km of 20” export line, 3” mono ethylene glycol line and fibre optic cable from the Breagh A platform location to a beach valve station located on Coatham Sands, Teesside, UK. The Allseas pipelay vessel Lorelay will lay the main section of the pipeline with the Tog Mor laying the nearshore section.

The Breagh A field is located in UKCS block 42/13 of the southern North Sea in 62 metres water depth, approximately 100 kilometres to the east of Teesside. Gas will be exported via the 20″ pipeline from the platform to the Teesside Gas Processing Plant. The contract for the construction of the 10km long onshore section of pipeline is expected to be awarded before the end of 2010.

René Pawel, Managing Director of RWE Dea UK, said “I am delighted that we have concluded the award of this contract and look forward to working closely with Allseas to achieve a successful installation of the Breagh pipeline next year”.

RWE Dea holds a 70% interest in the Breagh gas field as operator (Sterling Resources (UK) Limited – 30%). The estimated resources make Breagh and the surrounding fields one of the largest natural gas discoveries still to be developed in the UK Southern North Sea. The gas field is a conventional Carboniferous reservoir and the expected reserves will make a significant contribution to the growth of RWE Dea’s gas production. Further upside potential is expected in the surrounding exploration blocks.

“This significant contract is another major milestone in bringing the Breagh field into production and providing new gas gathering infrastructure to a relatively remote part of the UK gas basin. We are pleased to award this contract to such an experienced contractor as Allseas which will help us to achieve initial gas production of Breagh mid 2012,” said Ralf to Baben, Chief Operating Officer of RWE Dea AG.

Background information

RWE Dea AG, headquartered in Hamburg, is an international company operating in the field of exploration and production of natural gas and crude oil. The company deploys state-of-the-art drilling and production technologies and puts its many years’ experience acquired to good use in its activities. RWE Dea has set new standards in the fields of safety and environmental protection.

RWE Dea has stakes in production facilities and concessions in Egypt, Denmark, Germany, the UK and Norway, and holds exploration licenses in Algeria, Ireland, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Poland, and Turkmenistan. Moreover, in Germany RWE Dea also operates large subterranean storage facilities for natural gas. RWE Dea is part of the RWE Group, one of Europe’s largest energy utilities.

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Source:RWE Dea , November 26, 2010