Petrobras and its partners have approved the use of a buoy and mooring from Norway-based BW Offshore business APL on the Chinook Cascade floating production storage and offloading vessel, the “deepest-water” FPSO in the world.

BW Offshore will convert, install and operate the FPSO to service the Chinook and Cascade fields in the Gulf of Mexico.

The eight-year contract includes up to three years in options and includes the delivery and installation of an APL Submerged Turret Production Buoy, or STP, which disconnects should a hurricane approach.

Installation and start-up are slated for first-quart 2010, when up to 80,000 barrels of oil per day will begin filling the FPSO’s 600,000-barrel hold. The ship is also fitted with export kit for 16 million standard cubic feet per day.

When in position, the FPSO will sit atop 2.6 kilometres of GoM.