OT: Winner takes all in Malaysia. Malaysia players chase plum Petronas umbrella pact
Upstream, this week's issue
By James Tham
Offshore contractors in Malaysia are eyeing up a multi-million dollar umbrella pact for the transportation and installation of pipelines and platforms for the national oil company over the next three years.
Petronas, through its upstream subsidiary Petronas Carigali, recently issued tender documents for the frame agreement covering the installation of some 600 kilometres of pipelines and more than 20 structures , ranging from simple wellhead platforms to fully fledged production facilities, according to sources.
The exercise entails strict local content requirements and is open only to contractors licensed to operate offshore Malaysia.
The new tender follows the expiry of the existing frame agreement between Petronas and TL Offshore, a Crest Petroleum and J Ray McDermott joint venture.
The venture signed up for a three-year umbrella pact on 21 April 1998, which at the time it estimated would be worth more than 1 billion ringgit.
Bids for the new tender were originally due in this week but Petronas later extended the deadline by 20 days in response to industry pressure.
You realistically need six months to put together a proper bid for a tender of this size but we know not all the projects will materialise, said one source.
Indeed, a multi-page attachment in the tender documents talks about a number of projects that are not yet firm as well as solid opportunities such as Malaysia LNG Tiga (three).
The greenfield liquefied natural gas project in Bintulu, Sarawak, is backed by baseload gas sales contracts signed with Japanese buyers. It will draw offshore gas to supply two trains with production capacity of more than 6 million tonnes of LNG a year.
MLNG Tiga's offshore facilities include a riser platform with a 1300-tonne jacket and 2000-tonne deck, 156 kilometres of 30-inch inter-platform pipeline, a pair of 119-kilometre 32-inch pipelines connecting the fields to two points on the existing Bintulu trunkline, and several kilometres of infield pipelines and cables.
Installation work is due to commence early next year in order for the fields to come on stream in late 2002. Future upstream expansion involving two new drilling platforms is also listed in the agreement. |
