Van Oord has bought a Shallow Water Pipe Lay (SWPL) Barge for pipeline installation in shallow water.

With this barge Van Oord extends its services to the offshore industry. The purchase is in line with Van Oord’s growth strategy of its offshore activities and the reinforcement of its position as an Engineering, Procurement, Construction (main) contractor. The barge in under construction in Nantong, China and will be operational late 2012.

The length of the barge is 120 m and its width is 40 m. With this barge 18 - 48 inch pipelines can be installed in water depths from 6 - 50 m. In some cases, depending on the pipeline diameter, installation is possible to a depth of 100 m. The barge is equipped with a 500 tonnes crane and has accommodation for 300 people.

Together with the existing services for the construction of landfalls, the installation of rock, trench dredging and backfill and the installation of Single Point Mooring (SPM)-systems, this addition to the fleet will enable Van Oord to offer an integrated package of offshore services to oil and gas companies as EPC (main) contractor.

The investment comprises part of Van Oord’s comprehensive investment scheme for 2011-2015 of EUR 1 billion.

Source: vanoord, July 21, 2011