Lamprell Energy Ltd
Arabian knights
For more than 30 years the Lamprell Group has played an important role in developing and expanding the offshore industry in the Arabian Gulf by providing a wide range of services to oil and gas customers.
The company, which is headquartered in Sharjah, offers a full jackup rig refurbishment and upgrade service, together with fabrication and construction of FPSOs and other offshore equipment and facilities.
David Moran, chief operating officer at the company explains: “Lamprell originally started as a small family business around 30 years ago, and has grown rather dramatically since. During the early 1990s we refocused the business considerably, concentrating specifically on the drilling industry, particularly around upgrading and refurbishing offshore drilling rigs. This corresponded at the time with a growing market in the Arabian Gulf area, which we have helped to develop. Today Lamprell supports offshore rigs for refurbishment and repair, we also refurbish onshore land drilling rigs, and then finally we have new build activities based around FPSO vessels and building similar process modules that go onto fixed platforms.”
David elaborates on the vast range of services that Lamprell offers: “We carry out a very wide range of operations for a number of clients in the oil and gas sector. This ranges from minor modifications on rigs, including replacement steel work when there is steel corrosion, through to repairs on the legs, the hull and other structural parts. We also undertake far more extensive programmes of refurbishment for clients, involving upgrading of complex drilling equipment and replacing components such as high and low pressure pipe-work, all the support instrumentation for the equipment that is being changed down, and re-powering of rigs when the primary set of power generation packs are replaced.”
The extent of refurbishment work carried out by Lamprell is evident in the vast catalogue of projects it has completed, none more so than a near re-build of a highly damaged rig, which represented a unique challenge: “There is a rig that was very nearly destroyed by Hurricane Katrina two years ago, being ripped apart heavily in the storm,” says David. “Nabors Drilling in the US 
purchased it and brought it to our facilities here in the UAE, and basically we have totally rebuilt and upgraded the rig. We started the project at the end of 2006 and it will be finished at the end of this year. I think it is a significant step forward for us as it demonstrates our ability to take a rig that was almost entirely destroyed, and have it fully repaired and fully operational at an upgraded level 15 months later, which is an excellent achievement.”
Together with its traditional refurbishment, repair and upgrade services, in recent years Lamprell has commenced new build construction operations of offshore oil and gas structures: “In 2000 we recognised the need to become involved in the deeper water market, and we built a new facility accordingly in Dubai focused primarily on new build activities for FPSO vessels, and for building similar process modules used on fixed platforms and other special projects for the offshore industry. It was a move designed to broaden the activity base of the company by being involved in the downstream development of oil fields as well.”
David explains that the company intends to continue to expand in the future: “The oil and gas industry as a whole is going through a significant phase of growth, particularly where we are located in the Middle East, where you have over 60 per cent of the oil reserves in the world. We believe that there is a very strong base to continue to experience organic growth. We have successfully grown this business from what was a very small operation in the early 1990s to a very significant player in the Middle East now, and have created an excellent reputation. We foresee continued levels of growth and therefore feel that we have an excellent platform to continue to expand the business for the coming years,” he concludes.
Lamprell Energy Ltd
Service: Oil and gas refurbishment and fabrication services