Managing Director Cesar Guerra told reporters that the fabrication yard of Paenal Porto Amboim Estaleiros Navais at Porto Aboim, about 260 kilometers (162 miles) south of the capital, Luanda, is expected to complete the crane with a capacity to lift 2,500 metric tons next month.
"The crane will be ready by mid-June," Guerra said. "It will work on the FPSO for Total’s Clov project, N’Goma for SBM and Mafumeira for Chevron," he said, referring to floating production storage and offloading vessels for the respective French and Dutch companies, and the U.S. company’s most expensive project in Africa.
Angola, Africa’s largest crude oil producer after Nigeria, pumped 1.8 million barrels a day in April and state petroleum company Sonangol EP targets 2 million barrels a day by 2017. The southern African country’s crude accounted for 2.6 percent of U.S. imports in February and 12 percent of China’s in March, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Paris-based Total’s Clov project may start pumping crude next year from Block 17. Paenal will upgrade SBM’s FPSO Xikomba that was used by Exxon Mobil Corp. and rename it the N’Goma to work on the field of the same name in Block 15/06 operated by Italy’s Eni SpA (ENI), according to Guerra and the SBM website.
The strength of Paenal’s crane matches others at ports in Europe, Brazil, China and Singapore, while out-lifting the 800-ton capacity of the closest competitor in Africa, Guerra said. The world’s largest crane can lift 6,800 tons, the equivalent of 78 space shuttles, according to Engineering News-Record.
