Italian oil-company Eni has ruled out the use of a ship-based floating production storage and offloading vessel, or FPSO, at its near-arctic offshore field Goliat off northern Norway in favour of a concrete spar or Sevan “round-hulled” FPSO.

A source told Scandoil.com affiliated Scandinavian Oil-Gas Magazine that heavy icing in the western Barents Sea helped decide the issue. The oil company this week handed Aker Engineering & Technology (concrete hull) and Sevan Marine (“round hull”) the front-end engineering and design work for the floater.

The source said refining designs for the solution were now down to drawing up “a safe work environment” which shelters crews and production equipment from icing.

Heavy icing can collapse ship-hulls and create caverns of explosive fumes, while making just about all exposed tasks extra difficult.

Observers see Eni as the oil company most experienced at placing FPSOs, including the Norne FPSO in the Norwegian Sea, hitherto the most northerly placed offshore ship-hull FPSO in the world.

Eni’s $4.9-billion Goliat floater project could be producing 100,000 barrels a day by 2012 if ice-drawings and planning continue apace.

In its next issue, Scandinavian Oil-Gas Magazine pits Eni’s efficient decision-making in the western Barents against the challenge of chosing Arctic technology across the whole of the frigid Barents theatre.

ws@scandoil.com

Tags: Eni Norge AS