Article adapted from: Long-term Southeast Asia charters for Energy Drilling | Upstream Onlin
Singapore rig owner secures work for last two of recently acquired tender assist units.
Singapore’s Energy Drilling (EDrill) has secured long-term contracts for the remaining two of the three tender assist rigs it recently acquired for a combined US$85 million from Seadrill.
EDrill on Tuesday confirmed that it has won a firm two-year contract for the T16, which has been snapped up by CPOC for the phase six development drilling campaign in the Malaysia-Thailand Joint Development Area. The planned start date of this charter, which carries options for up to a further nine months, is October 2024.
Meanwhile, Thailand’s national upstream company PTTEP has awarded a three-year contract for the recently renamed EDrill Vencedor. This rig will be deployed on PTTEP’s producing Arthit field in the Gulf of Thailand, where PTTEP has plans for a pilot carbon capture and storage scheme.
EDrill Vencedor’s contract, which has an effective date of 1 October, is planned to commence no later than 1 July 2024. This firm three-year contract comes with a one-year option.
Both rigs will be towed to Crystal Offshore Shipyard in Singapore for complete reactivation and recertification before year-end in preparation for the start-up of drilling operations in the middle of next year.
“With the award of these two contracts and the one announced last month for the T15, we have managed to secure good long-term contracts for all three rigs that we acquired from Seadrill in July,” said Marcus Chew, Energy Drilling chief executive.
“These contracts into 2027 confirm the faith of our board and management in the tender rig space and put the company in a solid financial position to seize any opportunity for further growth.”
While no contract values or dayrates were disclosed for the latest two awards, PTTEP a couple of months signed a new three-year contract for the T-15, which EDrill said at the time was expected to add more than US$120 million in additional contract backlog.