Hyundai Heavy Industries Gets Massive Order

Posted : 02/25/13 7:36 AM

In recent news, Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) has disclosed it has been awarded a $1.1 billion contract for installing a Topside Facility on the Aasta Hansteen spar hull by Statoil. The Aasta Hansteen spar hull is also being constructed by a South Korean company, and this will come as a plus for South Korean heavy support industries. Statoil has given HHI a deadline date of sometime in 2016 for the installation of the Topside Facility, which is able to produce 23 million cubic meters. Construction may begin this month, however the spokesperson from Statoil is uncertain as to exactly when. This contract comes on the heels of the $800 million bid from Statoil for a spar hull off the northwestern Norwegian coast. Hyundai Heavy Industries will benefit greatly from this partnership with Statoil, and it is likely that, once the level of construction is up to HHI’s regular standard, the partnership will continue. HHI is usually a name associated with shipbuilding, but their industrial construction has seen action in the oil and gas fields for quite some time. The durability and dependability of their construction makes them desirable for the construction of offshore storage and drilling platforms as well as Topside Facilities, such as the one ordered for the the Aasta Hansteen gas field. In addition to these projects, HHI is also involved in the construction of two other floating production and storage facilities, one for British Petroleum and one for Eni Norge. Both of these companies know that HHI is a company they can trust. The Aasta Hansteen gas field was formerly called Luva and is located on Blocks 6706/12, 6707/10, approximately 186 miles – or 300 kilometers – from land in 4,265 feet – or 1,300 meters – of water in the Norwegian segment of the North Sea. Early this year, partners in the Aasta Hansteen project submitted a plan for development and operation to the Norwegian Ministry of Petroleum and Energy and the HHI contract is proof that the project is continuing on schedule. HHI will be seeing massive orders from the Oil and Gas sector as well as the shipping sector in coming months. Shipping companies have started looking at ways to incorporate money-saving green technologies into their hulls and HHI is no stranger to this, having been contracted to build Seaspan’s SAVER class ships. With this in mind, one can say that the future looks very bright for HHI.