Shapoorji Pallonji builds India’s largest floating rig for ONGC KG wells

Mumbai: Shapoorji Pallonji Oil & Gas, the only domestic specialist firm in building floating production storage and offloading units (FPSO) in the hydrocarbon industry, has built India's largest floating rig for ONGC to be deployed in the KG Basins. Named Armada Sterling V, the FPOS was built at the Sembcorp Shipyard in Singapore in association with Malaysia's Bumi Armada group. The company has a 70:30 joint venture with the Malaysian group, Shapoorji Pallonji Oil & Gas said in a statement on Thursday.

This is Shapoorji Pallonji's fourth FPSO and its third unit for domestic waters, it added.

Shapoorji Pallonji spokesman while refusing to divulge costing details told PTI that the vessel will be reaching the domestic waters sometime before December-end.

Armada Sterling V to be deployed in Cluster 2 of ONGC KG Block

Armada Sterling V will be deployed in Cluster 2 of ONGC's KG98/2 Block off the Vizag coast, making it the national oil major's first deep-water development where the oil and gas major is investing over USD 5 billion, which includes an FPSO, a process platform and other facilities.

Production of Cluster 2 is expected to peak at around 16.5 million standard cubic metres of gas per day and 78,000 barrels of crude oil per day, which if achieved can reduce the country's annual crude oil import bill by USD 4.5 billion, the statement claimed.

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Armada Sterling V is designed for continuous operations up to wave heights of over 27 metres and has been engineered and delivered by a team of Indian engineers and project personnel. The vessel has a design life of 20 years, without the need for dry docking, the company added.

The vessel features 13 modules and central pipe racks, weighing over 20,000 tonnes with a daily processing capacity of 60,000 barrels of liquids and 3 million standard cubic metres of gas.

Largest 'floater' in domestic waters: Shapoorji Pallonji

When deployed it will be the largest 'floater' in domestic waters, measuring 321 metres in length and 60 metres in width, with a storage capacity of over 8,00,000 barrels.

It is equipped with artificial intelligence and machine learning, radar-controlled oil slick monitoring technologies and remote monitoring, SP O&G chief executive Ravi Shankar said.

Venkata Sethuraman, president & chief financial officer of SP O&G, said the FPSO has been financed by a consortium of domestic banks in part and the rest by the debt capital market.

Ankit Garg, president of projects at SP O&G, said that the joint venture of SP O&G and Bumi Armada also operates two other FPSOs, Armada Sterling and Armada Sterling II, in the country's West Coast without disclosing the owners/contractors of the same.

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