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Last week, Petrobras released the final and official results of its last AHTS TS tender from earlier this year. The opportunity which saw Posidonia Shipping’s candidate Atlantic Kingfisher as best qualified offer, had received an appeal from one of the other bidders claiming the vessel did not meet a few tender requirements. After an evaluation process by Petrobras, the Oil Major turned down the appeal and ruled in favour of Posidonia’s offer, issuing the definitive award to Atlantic Kingfisher. The vessel is currently located in Canada and has to be delivered to Petrobras until December 2023, under REB flag, as per tender conditions. To convert the vessel to Brazilian flag, Posidonia should most likely use tonnage from the two PSV hulls acquired earlier in 2023.

In the first half of 2023, the Brazilian government acquired an accumulated share of oil of 7.27 million barrels, coming from the production sharing regime. This volume is more than double of the same period last year, when it was 3.6 million barrels.

The result was improved by the production of the fields of Mero (5 million barrels), Búzios (1 million barrels) and Sapinhoá (490 thousand barrels), all in Santos Basin. Another highlight is that the FPSO Guanabara installed in Mero, achieved a record monthly production of a pre-salt platform: 179.000 boed, in February.

Shell has informed the National Petroleum Agency (ANP) of the detection of natural gas signals in well 1-SHEL-35A-RJS, in block C-M-659, Campos Basin. The well is in a water depth of 2.940 meters and was drilled by Maersk Developer.  

The block was acquired by Shell in October 2019, during the 16th Bidding Round, for R$714 million. The company is the main operator of the block with a 40% share in partnership with Chevron (35%) and QPI (25%).

The Brazilian Institute for the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (Ibama) authorized the drilling of the well for up to six wells in the block, one firm and five contingent. It can also perform as many as four training tests in that area.

Petrobras has released a tender for chartering a FPSO to work on the Barracuda and Caratinga Fields Revitalization Project. The vessel will have the capacity to produce 100,000 boed and six million cubic meters of gas. Owners must submit their offers by March 18, 2024. According to Petrobras, the revitalization in Campos Basin, where Barracuda and Caratinga are located, is part of the largest project to recover mature assets in the world’s offshore industry.

Solstad Offshore secured two contract extensions for vessels Normand Pioneer and Normand Carioca. Normand Pioneer will continue to support subsea activities for PRIO, having been granted an extension of 18 months. While Normand Carioca, the only remaining PSV in Solstad’s fleet following the sale of its entire category to Tidewater, will be converted to a Well Stimulation Vessel (WSV) for Equinor, thus extending the current contract by four years firm. Normand Carioca has been working for Equinor ever since 2017 and this new agreement will see the vessel as a part of Equinor’s fleet for 10 years in a row, an impressive milestone. The shift in scopes of work is scheduled to take place during Q3 2023.

AHTS 21000 Thor II of owners Star Matrix (India) has recently concluded her term contract in Brazil. The vessel arrived in Brazilian waters July 2022 and has since been engaged in the AL-SUB project for end-client Petrobras. Throughout the Superpesa contract, she retrieved anchors, chains, suction piles and torpedo piles for Petrobras in Campos basin. We are pleased to have mediated the charter fixture as well as supported owners from vessel´s mob to Brazil, arrival and up to conclusion of her charter.

Petrobras released this week the official results  for the multiple-category PSVs tender that sought to charter up to 9 vessels with delivery for December 2023. Expectations were high and it was common sense in the market that Petrobras would end up awarding a good number of vessels  for this opportunity as this was seen as a “second round”  from a previous tender  last year where the Oil Major was not able to hire as many vessels as, most likely, originally intended.

However, out of the 16 candidates presented in this opportunity, Petrobras’ official report disclosed the award of just one vessel, Starnav Aquila, as PSV 4500 General Cargo. All remaining vessels were disqualified for excessive pricing with the exception of Starnav Cepheus and Bravante I, neither of which met the delivery windows, and CBO Copacabana for not complying with tender requirements.