Shah Deniz awards three new contracts for compression project
Baku, October 14, AZERTAC
The Shah Deniz consortium has announced the award of three major offshore contracts to advance the Shah Deniz Compression (SDC) project, bp told AZERTAC.
The contracts, with a combined value of approximately $700 million, have been awarded to the Saipem/BOS Shelf joint venture.
The scope of work under the contracts includes:
Transportation and installation of the entire SDC platform – a new 19,000-tonne facility to be installed in the Caspian Sea;
Engineering, procurement, construction and installation of subsea structures, including approximately 26 kilometres of new offshore pipelines, to connect the SDC platform with existing Shah Deniz infrastructure.
All onshore construction activities will be carried out at Baku Deep Water Jacket Factory, operated by BOS Shelf.
Offshore construction and installation will be executed using two of Azerbaijan’s flagship vessels:
The Khankendi, a state-of-the-art subsea construction vessel owned by the Shah Deniz consortium;
The Israfil Huseynov pipelay barge owned by the Azerbaijan Caspian Shipping Company (ASCO).
Both vessels will be operated by Saipem under the terms of the new contracts.
Matt Kirkham, bp vice president, projects, for the Azerbaijan, Georgia and Türkiye region, Middle East and Africa, said: “With the award of these new contracts for major construction and installation works, we are making significant progress on the SDC project. The contracts will fully leverage local fabrication yards and infrastructure, engaging the local workforce. This once again demonstrates that Azerbaijan possesses world-class onshore fabrication and offshore installation capabilities that fully meet international standards. Just one example – between 2026 and 2028, a total of 3,040 tonnes of subsea structures will be fabricated and installed as part of the SDC project. It’s a remarkable piece of activity that highlights the scale and ambition of what we are delivering. I would like to thank everyone who was involved in finalizing these important contracts.”
Offshore activities are expected to commence with pin pile installation in the third quarter of 2026, with completion targeted for 2029.
The $2.9 billion SDC project, the next stage of development of the giant Shah Deniz gas field, is designed to access and produce low pressure gas reserves in the field and maximize resources recovery.
The project is expected to enable around 50 billion cubic metres of additional gas and approximately 25 million barrels of additional condensate production and export from the Shah Deniz field.
The project involves installation of a new compression facility – an electrically-powered unmanned compression platform, or Normally Unattended Installation (eNUI). It will be installed in 85 metres water depth, approximately 3 kilometres from the existing Shah Deniz Bravo (SDB) platform.
With four 11-MW compressors onboard, the SDC platform is designed to serve as a host facility for gas compression from both the Shah Deniz Alpha (SDA) and SDB platforms, meaning that before flowing to the Sangachal terminal onshore, export gas from the platforms will be compressed at SDC.
The project also includes several associated facilities to be installed offshore in the Shah Deniz contract area, and additional brownfield works to be undertaken at SDA, SDB, and the Sangachal terminal.
Construction activities are planned to be completed in 2029 to be ready to receive first gas for compression from the SDA platform in 2029 and from the SDB platform in 2030.
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