TEESSIDE SCAFFOLDER
Well-known member
OGN Group's yard boosts UK fabrication sector with contract for Apache project.
It is a couple of weeks before Christmas and, from the outside at least, OGN Group's Hadrian Yard in Wallsend appears quiet. Weeds are pushing up between cracks in the concrete and OGN chairman Dennis Clark concedes there is little to see apart from "acres of space". However, a full car park at the former Amec yard on the River Tyne, a few kilometres east of Newcastle city centre, gives an indication that plenty of work is taking place inside.
Two months ago, OGN captured not just the business headlines but also the national news headlines when it secured a 150 million ($234 million) contract from Apache Corporation to build a 10,000-tonne bridge-linked platform for the US operator's Forties field in the UK North Sea. The job was not only a welcome boost for the hard-hit UK fabrication sector but also for the wider economic prospects of north-east England.
A team of about 70 engineers - the owners of most of the parked cars - were mobilised to the yard's offices in October and several million pounds are being spent reactivating and upgrading the mothballed 75-acre yard in readiness for the first wave of welders and fitters, who are set to be recruited this month.As construction shifts up through the gears in the coming months, up to 1000 jobs are expected to be created at peak, Clark says.
The last oil and gas work the Hadrian Yard saw was on E.ON Ruhrgas' Babbage project, which came to an end in September 2009, after which a variety of other uses was found for the site, such as storing cars.
The Apache platform is set to be one of the largest built on the River Tyne since the heyday of the 1970s, Clark says. Its topsides will weigh in at 5575 tonnes, sitting atop a 5200-tonne four-legged jacket linked by a 100 metre-long 450-tonne bridge to the existing Forties Alpha facility. It is due to be loaded out in June 2012, a schedule Clark admits is "challenging", though he is adamant the project will be given the attention it deserves. "The Apache team has shown a huge amount of faith in our capability... so we are determined to get the job finished at the time we promised them, to the right standard and with an overlay of safe operations," he says. "We are not going to do anything to prejudice that." OGN is chasing new projects, but Clark says it would be unlikely for it take a new order if it meant compromising the front-end of the Apache job. However, he insists: "This is not a one-project yard. This is a business." Most of the UK's remaining fabricators recently gathered at a forum in Sedgfield to discuss current opportunities, Clark says.
The line-up included north-east-based companies, such as McNulty Offshore Construction in South Shields, TAG Energy Solutions on Teesside, and Middlesbrough-based Wilton Engineering. There was also SLP under its new owner Smulders, as well as Scottish fabricators including BiFab and Inverness-based Global Engineering. Many yards, including OGN, are chasing work in the renewables sector, but traditional oil and gas projects are beginning to build in number. So much so, Clark says, that he believes a shortage of capacity could even be looming in the UK and Europe once orders on several UK projects, including BG Group's Lomond project, Total's West Franklin development and Nexen's sizeable Golden Eagle project are placed, though OGN is not chasing the first two. "The conversation was that there is a healthy fabrication sector in the UK and we are encouraging the clients to fully utilise it," says Clark, adding that he is heartened by Apache's decision to "choose British". "I honestly believe that Apache had a will to do this job in the UK and I congratulate them for that. Not every company thinks that way, even British ones," he says.
"They want to take this project to the next stage and they are using British companies.
"We have taken a management decision here that we are going to make maximum use of the local supply chain and we are doing that with Apache's support." On OGN's radar are construction contracts for the likes of Nexen's Golden Eagle project, Centrica's Baird gas storage development and GdF Suez's Cygnus gas project in the UK southern North Sea, as well as Talisman's MonArb development and private company Chrysaor's Solan project.
"Once they go into the market the capacity is looking thin, and the supply chain outside of the fabricators is starting to tighten," Clark says. He believes that, at a conservative estimate, operators are looking to build about 15 bridge-linked platforms in the next five years in the UK North Sea. "The North Sea oil and gas market is coming back to life and infrastructure investment looks set to increase further, which is great for Tyneside and the north-east region," he says.
.
It is a couple of weeks before Christmas and, from the outside at least, OGN Group's Hadrian Yard in Wallsend appears quiet. Weeds are pushing up between cracks in the concrete and OGN chairman Dennis Clark concedes there is little to see apart from "acres of space". However, a full car park at the former Amec yard on the River Tyne, a few kilometres east of Newcastle city centre, gives an indication that plenty of work is taking place inside.
Two months ago, OGN captured not just the business headlines but also the national news headlines when it secured a 150 million ($234 million) contract from Apache Corporation to build a 10,000-tonne bridge-linked platform for the US operator's Forties field in the UK North Sea. The job was not only a welcome boost for the hard-hit UK fabrication sector but also for the wider economic prospects of north-east England.
A team of about 70 engineers - the owners of most of the parked cars - were mobilised to the yard's offices in October and several million pounds are being spent reactivating and upgrading the mothballed 75-acre yard in readiness for the first wave of welders and fitters, who are set to be recruited this month.As construction shifts up through the gears in the coming months, up to 1000 jobs are expected to be created at peak, Clark says.
The last oil and gas work the Hadrian Yard saw was on E.ON Ruhrgas' Babbage project, which came to an end in September 2009, after which a variety of other uses was found for the site, such as storing cars.
The Apache platform is set to be one of the largest built on the River Tyne since the heyday of the 1970s, Clark says. Its topsides will weigh in at 5575 tonnes, sitting atop a 5200-tonne four-legged jacket linked by a 100 metre-long 450-tonne bridge to the existing Forties Alpha facility. It is due to be loaded out in June 2012, a schedule Clark admits is "challenging", though he is adamant the project will be given the attention it deserves. "The Apache team has shown a huge amount of faith in our capability... so we are determined to get the job finished at the time we promised them, to the right standard and with an overlay of safe operations," he says. "We are not going to do anything to prejudice that." OGN is chasing new projects, but Clark says it would be unlikely for it take a new order if it meant compromising the front-end of the Apache job. However, he insists: "This is not a one-project yard. This is a business." Most of the UK's remaining fabricators recently gathered at a forum in Sedgfield to discuss current opportunities, Clark says.
The line-up included north-east-based companies, such as McNulty Offshore Construction in South Shields, TAG Energy Solutions on Teesside, and Middlesbrough-based Wilton Engineering. There was also SLP under its new owner Smulders, as well as Scottish fabricators including BiFab and Inverness-based Global Engineering. Many yards, including OGN, are chasing work in the renewables sector, but traditional oil and gas projects are beginning to build in number. So much so, Clark says, that he believes a shortage of capacity could even be looming in the UK and Europe once orders on several UK projects, including BG Group's Lomond project, Total's West Franklin development and Nexen's sizeable Golden Eagle project are placed, though OGN is not chasing the first two. "The conversation was that there is a healthy fabrication sector in the UK and we are encouraging the clients to fully utilise it," says Clark, adding that he is heartened by Apache's decision to "choose British". "I honestly believe that Apache had a will to do this job in the UK and I congratulate them for that. Not every company thinks that way, even British ones," he says.
"They want to take this project to the next stage and they are using British companies.
"We have taken a management decision here that we are going to make maximum use of the local supply chain and we are doing that with Apache's support." On OGN's radar are construction contracts for the likes of Nexen's Golden Eagle project, Centrica's Baird gas storage development and GdF Suez's Cygnus gas project in the UK southern North Sea, as well as Talisman's MonArb development and private company Chrysaor's Solan project.
"Once they go into the market the capacity is looking thin, and the supply chain outside of the fabricators is starting to tighten," Clark says. He believes that, at a conservative estimate, operators are looking to build about 15 bridge-linked platforms in the next five years in the UK North Sea. "The North Sea oil and gas market is coming back to life and infrastructure investment looks set to increase further, which is great for Tyneside and the north-east region," he says.
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