Following technical investigation on the condition of the turret bearing on the Tullow’s FPSO Kwame Nkrumah, the company confirmed that the bearing has been damaged and is no longer able to rotate as originally designed.
The FPSO is moored in approximately 1,100 meters water depth on the Jubilee field, offshore Ghana.
Oil production and gas export can continue under revised operating and off-take procedures.
According to Tullow, the root cause analysis is ongoing and a project team is assessing which long-term remediation option is most appropriate.
The FPSO Kwame Nkrumah has now been placed on “heading control” through the use of tugs which minimize vessel movement around the bearing.
The company said it has implemented new operating procedures, including the use of a dynamically-positioned shuttle tanker and a storage tanker to assure safe production and off-take operations.
Paul McDade , COO, said: “We are focused on resolving this issue with the bearing on the FPSO Kwame Nkrumah in a timely and safe manner. We have appointed a highly experienced project team to work on a permanent solution while our operations team continues to ensure we have in place safe and sustainable arrangements for production from the field. Given the ability to continue production and because we have the appropriate insurance policies in place, we do not expect that this issue will have a material impact on our revenue.”
Tullow currently estimates that production from the FPSO will re-start in approximately two weeks and will also take time to ramp-up.