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Oil Company's Floating Production Storage Offloading (FPSO) Vessel Arrives at Harland & Wolff, Belfast for Upgrade

13th February 2024
Floating (oil) production and storage offloading vessel (FPSO) the MV Searose FPSO is at Harland & Wolff, Belfast for upgraded works to the 150,000dwt vessel which had been to the shipyard before in 2012, when AFLOAT captured in the facility’s Belfast Dry Dock, one of two building docks at the Queens Island site.
Floating (oil) production and storage offloading vessel (FPSO) the MV Searose FPSO is at Harland & Wolff, Belfast for upgraded works to the 150,000dwt vessel which had been to the shipyard before in 2012, when AFLOAT captured in the facility’s Belfast Dry Dock, one of two building docks at the Queens Island site. Credit: Jehan Ashmore

A Canadian flagged Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) vessel which arrived at shipyard, Harland & Wolff, Belfast is to undergo a £61m base contract to deliver a mid-life upgrade of the large ship, writes Jehan Ashmore

The contract for the 150,000 deadweight tonnes, MV Searose FPSO is with Cenovus Energy, an international integrated oil and natural gas company headquartered in Calgary, Canada, from where the 276m vessel sailed across the Atlantic Ocean to arrive on Saturday.

Work to upgrade the FPSO is to prepare the production vessel to operate in expanded duties at the company’s White Rose subwell oilfield off Newfoundland and Labrador as Upstream reported, but from 2026 is to operate at the West White Rose field.

Docking of the MV Searose FPSO took place the next day at H&W’s Main Building Dock, where the pair of iconic ‘Goliath’ type gantry cranes affectionately referred as ‘Samsun’ & ‘Goliath’ dominate over the facility at Queen's Island. 

In advance of the vessel's call, several work projects commenced at Belfast, that included inspections, procurement of steel, fabrication of customised blocks and other dry dock operations. Further fabrication involved one of the Group’s facilities, H&W (Arnish) on the Isle of Lewis & Harris in Scotland, so to ensure both marine engineering sites were prepared in readiness for the refurbishment and upgrading.

This is the second time Searose FPSO has been to H&W, as in 2012 the vessel was dry docked (in Belfast Dry-Dock as above) where the contract at the shipyard was then under different ownership, Harland & Wolff Heavy Industries Ltd. With this experience coupled with the shipyard's ability, to apply the latest technologies and innovations to upgrade the vessel, has helped Harland & Wolff to win the major contract for the Group which acquired the business from the previous owner in 2019.

On this occasion, the contract is expected to see 1,000 personnel on-site in Belfast where currently a cruise ship for a USA based owner as Afloat previously reported is undergoing maintenance and a major makeover prior to entering service from Florida in mid-June.

Published in Shipyards
Jehan Ashmore

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Jehan Ashmore

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Jehan Ashmore is a marine correspondent, researcher and photographer, specialising in Irish ports, shipping and the ferry sector serving the UK and directly to mainland Europe. Jehan also occasionally writes a column, 'Maritime' Dalkey for the (Dalkey Community Council Newsletter) in addition to contributing to UK marine periodicals. 

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Shipyards

Afloat will be focusing on news and developments of shipyards with newbuilds taking shape on either slipways and building halls.

The common practice of shipbuilding using modular construction, requires several yards make specific block sections that are towed to a single designated yard and joined together to complete the ship before been launched or floated out.

In addition, outfitting quays is where internal work on electrical and passenger facilities is installed (or upgraded if the ship is already in service). This work may involve newbuilds towed to another specialist yard, before the newbuild is completed as a new ship or of the same class, designed from the shipyard 'in-house' or from a naval architect consultancy. Shipyards also carry out repair and maintenance, overhaul, refit, survey, and conversion, for example, the addition or removal of cabins within a superstructure. All this requires ships to enter graving /dry-docks or floating drydocks, to enable access to the entire vessel out of the water.

Asides from shipbuilding, marine engineering projects such as offshore installations take place and others have diversified in the construction of offshore renewable projects, from wind-turbines and related tower structures. When ships are decommissioned and need to be disposed of, some yards have recycling facilities to segregate materials, though other vessels are run ashore, i.e. 'beached' and broken up there on site. The scrapped metal can be sold and made into other items.