BW Offshore has signed the contract with Premier Oil for the provision of a floating production, storage and offloading vessel to operate on the Catcher oil field in the UK North Sea.
The firm charter period of the contract is seven years, with extension options of up to 18 years. Based on a field life of 10 years, the contract value is US$2.3 billion, including FPSO charter rate and opex.
The contract follows a letter of award, signed on April 1.
Catcher is operated by Premier Oil (50% interest), with partners Cairn Energy (30%) and MOL (20%).
BW Offshore was awarded a FEED study as part of a funded tender process by Premier Oil in 4Q 2012, and has performed extensive engineering studies on the project during 2013 and 1Q 2014.
BW Offshore's scope includes the delivery of the FPSO, mooring system,installation and operation of the unit throughout the charter period. The FPSO will have a processing capacity of 60,000bopd and a storage capacity of 650,000bbl.
BW Offshore will order a new built hull from Japan for the project, while conversion and integration work will be performed in Singapore. The FPSO shall be ready for production mid-2017.
The project will be financed by a project specific bank facility of US$800 million and BW Offshore's existing liquidity.