Sheffield Forgemasters has won a major contract with Shell for offshore castings for use in the Gulf of Mexico (GoM).

Following a contract win earlier in 2017 with Samsung Heavy Industries for the first GoM offshore project to be sanctioned since offshore oil and gas markets crashed two years ago, the second offshore platform commissioned sees Forgemasters chosen for the supply of engineered cast components to Shell.

The project will see the company’s offshore oil and gas specialist, Vulcan SFM, deliver ten riser basket components weighing approximately 11.5 tonnes each for a semi-submersible platform which will be deployed in the GoM for Shell’s Vito development.

Paul Mockford, design director at Vulcan SFM, said: “These two contracts are the first signs of any return to offshore work after a complete cessation of new oil and gas developments on a worldwide basis which came into effect when the price of oil plummeted in 2015.

“We have been fortunate that our expertise in the field of supply to offshore projects, coupled with our long-term relationships with the major oil companies including Shell, helped us into a prime position to secure contracts on the first two projects commissioned requiring offshore platforms in more than two years.

“To win successive contracts of this nature, in what has become a very hungry supply chain due to an absence of offshore developments, is no small feat and is underpinned by our quality of manufacture and our unique expertise and experience in this market.

“Although it is far too early to speculate that the offshore oil and gas market is making any kind of quantitive return, the commencement of operations in the Gulf of Mexico is a very encouraging development, as is the increase in oil prices as they approach US$60 per barrel.”

Vulcan SFM will cast the riser baskets at Sheffield Forgemasters’ Brightside Lane foundry. They will be attached to the hull of the platform, in this case a semi-submersible, to support the various risers coming up from the sea-bed.

Mockford added: “The components we will supply are open cylinders with an internal profile which provides a bearing surface to directly support the riser.” 

The Vito platform is a planned 24,000-tonne production unit. Fabrication of the platform has yet to be awarded but Shell has already started securing suppliers for crucial components.

Sheffield Forgemasters commenced manufacture of the components for Shell in August and the completion is expected by June 2018. The company has a long history of supply into offshore oil and gas exploration and has pioneered many designs and materials, such as cast steel nodes and tethering components, which are used in oil and gas fields around the world.

Vito’s 2009 discovery well was opened in the Gulf of Mexico’s Mississippi Canyon Block 984 at a depth of more than 4,000 feet of water and could hold in excess of 300 million barrels of oil.

Shell is the operator of Vito and is partnered by Norway’s Statoil on the project.

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