NEPTUNE EXPLORER COMPLETED

Neptune Marine Oil & Gas have just completed a US$340 million upgrade of its DP deepwater drillship Neptune Explorer. The Pelican class drillship was acquired in 2005, and has undergone major upgrading and reactivation works at the Sembawang Shipyard in Singapore. The overhaul of the drillship included the installation of a new fifth-generation drilling package.

US DRILLING ACTIVITY OCT 2 2009

US rig count gains another 7 units as to 1,024 rigs working. Land operations gained 4 rigs to reach 983 working. Rig counts in inland waters gained 2 units to 9 rigs and in the Gulf of Mexico, the count grew by 1 rig to reach 31. A total of 32 rigs were working in US coastal waters. The number of rigs drilling for oil increased by 6 rigs to 303 this week, while those drilling for natural gas were up 2 to 712 units. There were 9 rigs unclassified, which is down 1 rig from last week. Directional drilling decreased by 10 rigs to 184 units, while horizontal drilling gained 2 units to 444 rigs in operation. Texas made the largest gain among the major producing states, up 14 to 390 units drilling. Rig counts for Alaska, Arkansas, California, Louisiana, and Wyoming all remained unchanged at 6, 40, 21, 153, and 38, respectively. New Mexico and North Dakota each lost 1 rig reaching 46 and 47 units drilling, respectively. Down 2 rigs was Oklahoma with 74 units working. Colorado’s count reached 39 rigs, down 7 units from a week ago. In other states of interest, Utah gained 3 rigs to 16, Pennsylvania gained 2 rigs to 56, and West Virginia. remained unchanged at 20 units. Canada’s rig count increased by 10 units to 238 this week, compared with 431 rigs working in the same period last year.

NEW DRILLSHIP

Chevron USA Inc. has started operations with the Transocean Discoverer Clear Leader ultra-deepwater drillship in the Gulf of Mexico. Chevron is using the specially built vessel under a 5-year contract with Transocean on projects including Tahiti and Jack/St. Malo fields. Transocean technology enables the drillship to conduct parallel drilling operations from a single derrick. The ship can drill to 40,000 ft in as much as 12,000 ft of water. The drilling contractor will commission a second drillship for Chevron, the Discoverer Inspiration, early next year. The vessels are among five ultra-deepwater enhanced Enterprise-class drillships that Transocean plans to commission this year and next. Others, all under contract, are Discoverer Americas, Discoverer India, and Discoverer Luanda. The double-hull, dynamically positioned Discoverer Clear Leader is 835 ft long, 125 ft wide, and a 62 ft deep and has an operating draft of 42 ft. Its moon pool measures 72.5 ft by 30 ft. The 226-ft dual-activity derrick measures 80 ft by 80 ft at the base and 20 ft by 60 ft at the top. The ship can work in winds up to 60 knots and waves as high as 30 ft. Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co. Ltd. built the ship at Okpo, South Korea.

Timor Sea Rig Blowout Update

The attempt to plug a well which has been leaking oil into the Timor Sea for more than a month has failed. The spill at PTTEP Australasia's Montara well-head platform, where Seadrills jackup rig West Atlas was drilling more than 200km off the Kimberley coast, began on August 21. Some images after the incident showed sweet light crude oil and condensate enveloping the rig and personnel were all safely evacuated. PTTEP have announced that the first attempt to pump heavy mud into the leaking well have failed. The drilling team had to locate and intersect a piece of steel casing, 2.6km below the sea bed. The intercept operation may involve several passes and complex calculations using sophisticated equipment and software to narrow down the exact location of the leaking well casing. The rescue intervention rig West Triton is performing the task. In spite of the politicizing of the incident such events like this are very rare. The causes of the incident are being investigated

John Payne