India’s Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) said it is in exploratory talks with domestic shipyards to build two jack-up drilling rigs worth about $500 million to $550 million.
ONGC’s board of directors recently approved plans to build an offshore drilling rigs.
Om Prakash Singh, ONGC’s director of technology and field services, said the rigs will replace some of the company’s older platforms that have been in operation for more than 40 years and will be dismantled in the next few years. Placing orders at Indian shipyards will help the Indian shipbuilding industry develop its ability to manufacture advanced drilling rigs, and he estimates that it will take about 3-3.5 years to build a jack-up drilling rig.
It is understood that before 1990, local Indian shipyards had built two jack-up drilling platforms and one floating rig for ONGC. However, no offshore drilling rigs have been built by Indian shipyards in the decades since.
ONGC currently has a fleet of 113 rigs, including 38 offshore rigs and counting.ONGC also has about 90 workover rigs.Of the 38 offshore drilling rigs, 20% are owned and the rest are leased. As for land rigs, only about 20% are leased and the rest are owned.
It is worth mentioning that a few days ago Seatrium announced that its US subsidiary, Seatrium Letourneau USA (SLET), signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Cochin Shipyard in India to jointly design and supply key equipment for jack-up drilling rigs for the Indian market. The two companies will collaborate on the development of offshore drilling rigs specifically designed to meet the needs of the Indian market.