Key points
- North Sea Shipping will supply a 160-metre dynamically positioned mining support vessel on a five-year charter, with an option to extend for another five years.
- The vessel’s hull is being built at RMK Marine in Tuzla, Turkey, with hull completion set for July 2009 and outfitting by Astilleros Barreras in Vigo, Spain, finishing in June 2010.
- The vessel is 30 metres wide, has a seven-metre draft, 14,200-tonne displacement, a 400-tonne heave-compensated crane rated to 2,500 metres water depth, 21 megawatts of installed power, capacity for 120 people and a 2,900-square-metre deck.
- The MSV contract is valued at approximately US$125-million over its initial five-year term, and CEO Stephen Rogers said the award keeps Nautilus on track for production start in 2010, subject to permitting and approvals.
Nautilus Minerals Inc. has entered into a binding agreement with North Sea Shipping Holding AS to provide the specialist mining support vessel (MSV) for Nautilus’s Solwara 1 project in Papua New Guinea. North Sea Shipping is a leading Norwegian ship owner and operator in the offshore oil and gas industry. North Sea Shipping will provide a 160-metre dynamically positioned specialist new ship on a five-year charter basis with options to extend for another five years.
Stephen Rogers, Nautilus’s chief executive officer, commented: “The MSV award is a key milestone for the Solwara 1 project. Our exhaustive and highly competitive selection process has yielded an excellent MSV which could not be a better match to the specified requirements. The working relationship developed with North Sea Shipping through the negotiation process has created a solid foundation for the future. The MSV award keeps Nautilus on track for commencement of production in 2010, subject to timely permitting and approvals.”
North Sea Shipping was selected from a short list after a competitive engineering evaluation. The build of the hull is already well advanced at one of Turkey’s leading shipbuilders RMK Marine, based in Tuzla, south of Istanbul. On completion of hull fabrication in July, 2009, the vessel will be outfitted by Astilleros Barreras, at its Vigo yard in Spain, with completion scheduled in June, 2010.
The 160-metre vessel is 30 metres wide, has a draft of seven m and displacement of 14,200 tonnes. It has some outstanding features which make it ideal as a candidate for sea floor mining. These include a 400-tonne heave-compensated crane, which is capable of working at 2,500 m water depth and total installed power of 21 megawatts, which will allow it to satisfy both ship and mining equipment demands. The vessel can accommodate 120 people, which is more than adequate for the marine and mining crew, and has a deck area of 2,900 square metres, which will accommodate the mining equipment.
The value of the MSV contract is approximately $125-million (U.S.) over the initial five-year period.
About North Sea Shipping
North Sea Shipping is a leading ship owner based outside Bergen on the west coast of Norway. This family owned business has been operating ocean-going vessels for several generations, and support vessels in the oil and gas industry since 1980. Today, North Sea shipping is actively involved in 16 vessels operating in the oil and gas sector, as well as the cable-laying business. For more information please see North Sea’s website.
