Offshore Energy Today Nov 30 2018 – John Fredriksen’s Northern Drilling has decided to take early delivery of its newbuild semi-submersible rig West Mira as a result of new options exercised under the rig’s contract with Wintershall.Â
To remind, Wintershall last June awarded a firm six-well contract to the West Mira rig for operations at Wintershall’s Nova field. The contract was expected to start in March 2020.
However, the rig owner said on Friday that Wintershall in October and November exercised two front-end options under the West Mira contract bringing expected start date forward to the fourth quarter of 2019.
Wintershall has additional front-end options outstanding bringing potential start date forward to third quarter 2019 should all options be exercised.
As a result of Wintershall exercising front end options and the positive prospects of further options to potentially be exercised, Northern Drilling has elected to take early delivery of West Mira from the shipyard. Expected delivery of West Mira is now set to early December 2018.
According to Northern, West Mira will be the world’s first modern drilling rig equipped with a low emission hybrid power plant with batteries. Integration of batteries in power supply and distribution system on a drilling rig is expected to reduce fuel consumption, CO2 and NOx emissions significantly.
Northern Drilling bought the West Mira rig from Hyundai Heavy Industries after Seadrill had canceled the contract due to the yard’s inability to deliver the rig on time. Northern also bought the Bollsta Dolphin semi-submersible from Hyundai last December. The original client for the rig, Fred. Olsen Energy, canceled the order in 2015 as a result of the delays in delivery date.
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Photo: Northern Drilling
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