Rigs report: jack-up market surges with Middle East driving growth

In May, Transocean disclosed its Q1 results for 2022 and gave an update on the status of its fleet amid rising day rates for both its ultra-deepwater and harsh-environment semi-submersible fleets.

As OSJ noted, utilisation rates have improved considerably of late: Transocean projects average contract day rates for its ultra-deepwater fleet to rise to US$355,000 per day in Q1 2023, up from US$312,000 per day for Q2 2022. Likewise, it projects rates for its fleet of harsh environment semi-submersibles to climb from US$386,000 in Q2 2022 to US$439,000 in Q1 2023.

Since May, the Deepwater Skyros unit has clinched a new 10-well contract from French major TotalEnergies for work offshore Angola. The 18-month contract has an average day rate of US$310,000/day.
Equinor awarded the Transocean Spitsbergen semi-submersible rig a firm nine-well drilling programme with options for a further two wells. The 18-month contract is valued at Nkr2.4Bn (US$253M).

In the North Sea, Scottish decommissioning specialist Well-Safe Solutions announced it has been contracted by Ithaca Energy to plug and abandon six wells on the Anglia Platform in the southern North Sea.

The Aberdeen-based outfit will provide project management, well engineering and all managed delivery services for the project. An option to plug and abandon an additional three subsea wells is also available during 2023. The contract sum remains undisclosed.

An NGO, the Australian Conservation Foundation, has sought an injunction in the Federal Court of Australia related to project activities in Woodside Energy’s Scarborough development. In 2021, Woodside approved the development of the US$12Bn project – the biggest to be built in Australia in a decade.

Located approximately 375 km off the coast of Western Australia, the Scarborough field is estimated to contain 11.1Tn cubic feet of dry gas with first LNG cargo from the project targeted for 2026.
In a public statement, ACF called the project “a massive carbon bomb” and said  “it should not proceed.”

“This is absolutely not the time to be approving new gas or coal projects – it is completely at odds with effective climate action”, the NGO said.

Woodside chief executive Meg O’Neill said the project is underway, having received primary environmental approvals. Ms O’Neill said, “Woodside will vigorously defend its position in these proceedings.”

And finally, a senior official in Russia-occupied Crimea has reported an attack on three Russian-controlled oil rigs in the Black Sea. One of the rigs, Chernomorneftegaz, is on fire 24 hours after the alleged strike. The rigs are located 71 km off Odessa.

Writing on social media on 20 June, Sergey Aksyonov, the governor of the Crimean Peninsula, commented “This morning the enemy struck the drilling platforms of Chernomorneftegaz... I am in touch with colleagues from the Defense Ministry and the FSB. We are working to rescue people.”  

The incident has not been confirmed by Ukrainian officials.

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