Zadco lets Upper Zakum expansion contract

Zakum Development Co. (Zadco) has let a lump-sum engineering, procurement, fabrication, installation, commissioning, and start-up contract to a consortium of Technip and National Petroleum Construction Co. in its project to expand production capacity of Upper Zakum oil field offshore Abu Dhabi.

Zadco is building artificial islands in 5-15 m of water to support drilling and other facilities in a project that will boost Upper Zakum production from about 550,000 b/d to 750,000 b/d by 2015 (OGJ Online, May 3, 2011).

The field is 84 km off Abu Dhabi.

The Technip-NPCC contract covers 240 km of subsea pipelines with diameters of 6-42 in.; 128 km of subsea composite and fiber-optic cables; almost 30,000 tons of offshore structures such as jackets, riser platforms, flare towers, and bridges, including 3,000 tons of island modules and bridges; and initial production facilities for temporary well hook-ups for early production distributed among three of the artificial islands.

Zadco plans to retire steel structures now in place on the field as production comes on stream from extended-reach wells drilled from the islands.