Is Shell still waiting in Dutch Harbor?

Professional Mariner Forum
21

I think you misspoke. French Guyana broke off and drifted across the Atlantic some time ago; its next door to our friends in Brazil.

Obviously, I don’t know anything about drilling, but it seems obvious to me that they should order a course change and send the STENA ICEMAX through the Northwest Passage to the Beaufort and drill as many wells as they can this season. I’m sure they can find another drillship for Guyana or just wait a few months.

I don’t have charts of the North Slope and I have not plotted the well locations, but I assume its relatively shallow where they are planning to drill that close to shore. I imagine that they will install fixed platforms if they do find oil.

It looks like NANUQ is standing by with two small tankers in Kotzebue Sound.

22

[QUOTE=tugsailor;78296]I think you misspoke. French Guyana broke off and drifted across the Atlantic some time ago; its next door to our friends in Brazil.[/QUOTE]

You’re right of course…same ocean different side. I was thinking it was French Guinea they were talking about. In the article they use the spelling Guiana.

Shell are still Bozo’s for sending such a phenomenal and capable ship to what is I would imagine a pretty benign environment when they have 30billion barrels potential in the arctic to grab. The only thing I imagine is that Shell US is run pretty independently from the other divisions and they are the ones who can’t get past the need to stay married to Noble and all that junk equipment. Maybe the head office will force that to change or maybe not.

23

Actually, I need to state that the STENA DRILLMAX ICE is not the right ship for the arctic Alaska but she’s also way too much ship for French Guiana. She was built for harsh environment drilling such as off of Greenland. Not the shallow waters of the Chukchi or Beaufort Seas.

What the arctic needs is a purpose built rig that is not a ship shape but much more like the KULLUK but much bigger. What needs to go is the DISCOVERER. She is not purpose built for the arctic, is the wrong shape and is too just goddamned OLD and primitive for the job.

24

What is the water depth where they are planning to drill?

25

[QUOTE=tugsailor;78330]What is the water depth where they are planning to drill?[/QUOTE]

I believe something like 150’ in the Beaufort and 250’ in the Chukchi Seas.

26

Why do it right the first time when you can do it 2 or 3 times. Always in a Hurry.

27

[QUOTE=Louis;78334]Why do it right the first time when you can do it 2 or 3 times. Always in a Hurry.[/QUOTE]

But they haven’t been pressured to rush things through. Shell had years to get ready for this season. It is almost like they set themselves up to fail. How could something like a spill barge not be ready? That should have been ready a year ago. Not that it was a piece of working equipment that had to be brought in for the season. The emissions on the rig engines is another. The KULLUK hasn’t worked in years and the DISCO was in a shipyard in Brisbane, Australia for 10 months. Why not get the engines modified there when they had all that time? Why wait to get the ship to Seattle to start that process or had they been working on that for a long time but not able to ever get those engines to pass? That is why I keep saying that Shell must give up on using all this old shit when the environmental hurdles are so high. Just build new and build it to pass with all the newest technology. If this season is fucked now over engine missions and a barge then it is human error to execute a flawed plan pure and simple. Shell must rethink this program entirely but they won’t. It’ll continue to be the same thing over and over. They were up there in 2008 I believe but didn’t get their permits first so that’s a black eye but I wonder if they were really ready to drill that year (I’ve heard that they weren’t…that going to Alaska was just to show the flag so to speak), then the moratorium shut them down last year so now it’s 2012 and this time everybody including myself felt that they had to be ready this time, but they have proven that they weren’t and I am flabbergasted over this. So maybe the third try will be the charmed one. I hope so, but I still see a flawed plan with the wrong people and equipment but it’s too late to change it (at least the equipment part). The hard decisions needed to have been made in 2008 when Shell tried to get their arctic class ships on the cheap with a stupid idea that Frontier sold to them and they bought it. That failed so Shell is stuck with the DISCO and the KULLUK. They’ll now have one more year to prepare but look at the cost in money and reputation to Shell! I will not be surprised one bit if the cost is over $1B and who knows what loss in share value will be? As I had posted from one financial analyst, he was not happy at all that Shell’s Arctic program was looking so dim for this year. Shell has been telling the investment world that the Arctic was going to be huge and that Shell was going to get the lion’s share of the rewards. That may prove correct in the long run but in the short term Shell is not showing the world that they can make it to that promised land. I believe heads should roll in Houston and Anchorage. Senior people need to be frogmarched out the door with a cardboard box in their hands…

28

Just an additional observation but I check the news frequently and even since July 27th when Shell announced scaling back their drilling plans there has been almost a total blackout in press releases or articles about the program moving forward. Just finding out that the DISCO and KULLUK were still in Dutch was only because tugsailor asked the question here. I had expected they had left a week ago to just get set up on their anchors. At least the KULLUK anyway. Shell does not want the world to know the scale of the failure here. Just say nothing and hope the press forgets you are still up there.

29

I don’t know what the towing speeds are, but I assume about a week to get to the first drill site northwest of Cape Lisburne in the Chukchi, and probably closer to two weeks to tow KULLIUK all the way to off Prudhoe Bay in the Beaufort. It seems to me that they had better get going, if they still plan to go at all.

Isn’t there some work they could do, like spudding in the wells before the oil spill barge arrives?

What’s the story on those foreign flag tankers that are standing by in Kotzebue Sound? Is that just the fuel supply for the season?

30

I believe they have 1 tanker as a fuel ship. Prob. Looking at 2 weeks atleast to get up there with arctic challenger, if and when I gets going. The kulluk made about 5kts avg. on the way up there.

31

Tanker affinity is the fuel ship for the fleet. She left bout week ago. Noble discover still anchored and kulliuck or how ever you spell that at the dock. No movement oh and a one Harvey boat as well as Crowley tug barges

32

[QUOTE=jmad;78346]Tanker affinity is the fuel ship for the fleet.[/QUOTE]

They’re using a foreign flag tanker? It better have lifted its cargo from a foreign port! If I was PetroMarine or Delta Western I’d be screaming my head off at the outrage of it all! Why the hell do they need a tanker anyway? What a barge couldn’t do the job?

33

[QUOTE=tugsailor;78343]I don’t know what the towing speeds are, but I assume about a week to get to the first drill site northwest of Cape Lisburne in the Chukchi, and probably closer to two weeks to tow KULLIUK all the way to off Prudhoe Bay in the Beaufort. It seems to me that they had better get going, if they still plan to go at all.[/QUOTE]

There is exactly 6 weeks left on the permit for the DISCO and 11 on the KULLUK’s, but they have to suspend drilling during the Bowhead Whale migration.

[B][I]WTF![/I][/B]

34

AIS has the Singapore flag tanker MOOR in Kotzebue Sound.

Ship Type: Oil/chemical tanker
Length x Breadth: 127m X 20m
Speed recorded (Max / Average): 11.5 / 11 knots
Flag: Singapore [SG] Call Sign: 9VJQ6
MMSI: 565632000 IMO: 9359595

and the Singapore Flag AFFINITY

Ship Type: Oil products tanker
Length x Breadth: 228m X 32m
Speed recorded (Max / Average): 14.5 / 11.1 knots
Flag: Singapore [SG] Call Sign: 9VDT5
MMSI: 564719000 IMO: 9289776

the ARCTIC RESPONDER 2 and ARCTIC RESPONDER 5 (they appear to be small craft) and NANUQ are hovering near the AFFINITY.

Ship Type: Anti-Pollution
Length x Breadth: 11 m X 3 m
Speed recorded (Max / Average): 17.4 / 10.4 knots
Flag: USA [US]
Call Sign: WDD8932
IMO: 0, MMSI: 367304740

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[QUOTE=tugsailor;78364]and the Singapore Flag AFFINITY

Ship Type: Oil products tanker
Length x Breadth:[B][I][U] 228m X 32m[/U][/I][/B][/QUOTE]

How much effing fuel do they plan to burn up there? A ship that big must carry close to 700k barrels for Christ’s sake! Simple incredible the scale of the idiocy!

AH SHIT! I think know what she’s there for! I bet she is empty and Shell has her there in case they wanted to do any extended well tests. And the smaller tanker has the fuel aboard…has to be?

36

Affinity is the flotillas fuel ship. Trust me I watched every boat come in and practice coming alongside and hooking up before they left for bunkering procedures as well as talked with the Crowley PIC that was in charge o safety and overseeing lol.

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[ATTACH]2193[/ATTACH]

And there still at the dock.

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[QUOTE=jmad;78368]Affinity is the flotillas fuel ship. Trust me I watched every boat come in and practice coming alongside and hooking up before they left for bunkering procedures as well as talked with the Crowley PIC that was in charge o safety and overseeing lol.[/QUOTE]

I think I’ll have to take a couple of pinkies and have a little lie down now…

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[QUOTE=jmad;78369]And there still at the dock.[/QUOTE]

orient me with this photo…what plant is that in the background? This is taken in Captain’s Bay…correct?

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Alaska Governor Asks Salazar to Expedite Point Thomson Decision
By Dan Murtaugh - Aug 12, 2012 5:31 PM ET

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Alaska Governor Sean Parnell asked U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to help expedite an Army Corps of Engineers decision on permits to develop the state’s Point Thomson oil and gas field after it was delayed.

The decision was delayed to as late as December from September, Parnell said in an Aug. 11 letter to Salazar, which was e-mailed yesterday, Sharon Leighow, an Anchorage-based spokeswoman for the governor, said in an e-mailed statement.

Point Thomson includes 38 leases on roughly 93,000 acres of land about 60 miles east of Prudhoe Bay on Alaska’s North Slope. It’s estimated to hold as much as 8 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and hundreds of millions of barrels of gas liquids and oil, according to Alaska’s Department of Natural Resources.

Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM), ConocoPhillips (COP) and BP Plc (BP/) resolved a lawsuit on March 30 that they filed against Alaska in 2006 after the state revoked their leases for failing to submit an acceptable development plan.

Under the settlement, a facility is being designed to produce 200 million cubic feet of gas a day and 10,000 barrels of condensate a day, according to the March agreement filed in state court in Anchorage. The facility is scheduled for completion in 2016, according to the agreement. A liquid hydrocarbon pipeline that can move 70,000 barrels a day is also being designed.

Permitting delays “would jeopardize critical energy production from the North Slope to boost the flow of oil through the Trans Alaska Pipeline System and the creation of thousands of jobs that our country so desperately needs,” Parnell said in the letter.

To contact the reporter on this story: Dan Murtaugh in Houston at dmurtaugh@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dan Stets at dstets@bloomberg.net