Latest update April 11th, 2025 9:20 AM
Dutch, Japanese companies in battle to build Guyana’s largest, most expensive oil ship
Kaieteur News – Floater heavyweights Dutch, SBM Offshore and Japanese, Mitsui Ocean Development & Engineering Company (MODEC) are expected to engage in a new pre-front end engineering and design race to supply US supermajor ExxonMobil with the seventh floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) for the prolific Stabroek block offshore Guyana.
This is according to Upstream Online, a leading global oil, gas and energy news resource. The media entity reported that ExxonMobil has already green-lighted five projects to produce massive recoverable resources of 11 billion barrels of oil equivalent in Stabroek.
Two floaters — the Liza Destiny and Liza Unity — are already producing close to 400,000 barrels per day of oil from the giant Liza field. The Prosperity FPSO is set to enter operation later this year in the Payara field, to be followed by the One Guyana FPSO in the Yellowtail field in 2025 and the Errea Wittu FPSO in the Uaru field in 2026.
Netherlands-based SBM is responsible for the first four floaters, while Japan’s Modec is in charge of building the unit that will be installed at Uaru. ExxonMobil has selected SBM to supply the FPSO that will produce from Whiptail, the sixth development at Stabroek, but a final investment decision is only expected to take place by the end of the year.
An FPSO offshore Guyana
Over the past few months, ExxonMobil and project partners Hess and CNOOC International have been conducting appraisal work near the Fangtooth-1 discovery in an attempt to gather more data from the area, with rumours suggesting the find will be the seventh development in Guyana.
“I am hearing it will probably be a new pre-FEED competition between SBM and Modec but there is nothing set in stone yet,” one floater source told Upstream. “There is the normal engagement these days but nothing too specific or advanced. I imagine it will warm up towards the end of the year, when and if they confirm the seventh FPSO is a go.”
Besides defining the location of the unit, ExxonMobil is also working on project specifications with sources suggesting the FPSO could be as big as recent floaters ordered for Stabroek, such as the ones for Yellowtail and Uaru.
The Errea Wittu FPSO will be the largest unit to enter operation in Guyana and will feature a processing capacity of 250,000 bpd and 540 million cubic feet per day of natural gas. Another source recalled that SBM and Modec competed for similar pre-FEED studies when ExxonMobil was making plans to contract its fifth Guyana FPSO before the deal signed with the Japanese company.
On top of running appraisal activities at Fangtooth-1, ExxonMobil earlier this year made a nearby discovery called Lancetfish-1, which could result in a joint development. Both Fangtooh-1 and Lancetfish-1 were drilled to deeper horizons than previous probes in Stabroek and proved the existence of hydrocarbons at Campanian and Santonian-aged reservoirs, opening up a new frontier in the licence. Additional exploration work is planned around the Fangtooth-1 discovery in the second half, including drilling of the Basher-1 and Lanternfish-1 prospects.
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