SK, UOP to assess Rawdhatain damage

15 February 2002

A team of South Korea's SK Engineering & Construction and US-based UOP has been appointed to assess the damage caused to installations at the Rawdhatain oil field, following the 31 January explosion. The award was made by Geneva-based Robertson & Company, which has been appointed as the international loss adjustor by Kuwait Oil Company(KOC - MEED 8:2:02).

The late-January explosion caused extensive damage to the 280,000-barrel-a-day (b/d) gathering centre (GC) 15, gas booster station 130, a 132/11-kV substation and related pipelines. It also knocked out power supplies to the 120,000-b/d GC 23 and the 200,000-b/d GC 25, resulting in a 600,000-b/d cut in local oil production.

The SK/UOP team is expected to submit a report by mid March. UOP will assess the damage to equipment at GC 15 and booster station 130. SK Engineering will carry out a survey of the structural and civil damage and will also prepare a cost estimation report.

The three main installations at Rawdhatain have suffered about 90 per cent damage. At GC 15, the control room, oil manifold and fire-fighting system have suffered extensive damage, as have the four compressor units and gas turbines at booster station 130.

'No official estimates have been given about the cost of reconstructing the damaged facilities, though the initial cost was about KD 110 million [$354 million],' National Bank of Kuwaitsaid in an 11 February report.

KOC has appointed UK-based insurance and reinsurance giant AIG as underwriter for the losses.

The loss of production from Rawdhatain and adjoining northern oil fields is being offset by increased output from Burgan and Minagish. At the same time, KOC has managed to restore power to GC 23 and GC 25 through a temporary link with Shuaiba. It has also installed a bypass pipeline from Sabriyah to GC 23, enabling the facility to resume production at about 50,000 b/d. Efforts are being made to resume production at GC 25, KOC says.

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