China's Offshore Oil Engineering Company (COOEC) has completed construction of the 1700-tonne jacket for Shell's HI shallow-water gas condensate development offshore Nigeria. The project's engineering, procurement, and construction package includes this four-legged jacket and a four-deck topsides module.

Project Scope and Infrastructure

The HI development will utilize a four-slot wellhead platform. Produced gas will be transported via a multiphase pipeline to a processing plant on Bonny Island. From there, processed gas will be piped to the Nigeria LNG (NLNG) complex, and condensate will be sent to the Bonny export terminal.

Facility Specifications and Construction Status

The completed jacket stands at 103 meters, reported as the tallest facility built by COOEC's Tianjin yard to date. Commissioning of the topsides module is currently underway, with final delivery expected in January of next year. The project's construction manager highlighted a "first-pass" welding success rate exceeding 99.7% during construction.

Field Details and Project History

The HI field was discovered in 1985 and is located in Oil Mining Licence (OML) 144, approximately 50 kilometers from shore in about 100 meters of water. On the drawing board for 40 years, the project aims to tap estimated recoverable reserves of about 285 million barrels of oil equivalent. The asset holds total resources of more than 1.7 trillion cubic feet of gas and 13 million barrels of condensate.

Contracts and Timeline

Shell awarded the platform's EPC contract to COOEC in 2024, with Petrofac performing the front-end engineering and design. COOEC cut first steel in March. Following the final investment decision in October, Shell awarded the integrated drilling contract to Halliburton last month. Production start-up is expected before the end of this decade.

Production Impact and Ownership

Upon completion, the development is slated to supply 350 million cubic feet of gas per day to the NLNG plant on Bonny Island, which is expected to boost the facility's production capacity by 35%. Shell holds a 25.6% stake in the NLNG plant. In OML 144, Shell holds a 40% operating stake and is partnered by the independent Nigerian E&P company Sunlink.