Speech by Mr Choo Chiau Beng_ Chairman _ CEO of Keppel Offshore

							SPEECH BY MR CHOO CHIAU BENG,
CHAIRMAN & CEO, KEPPEL OFFSHORE & MARINE
AT THE “P-52: MILESTONE IN PARTNERSHIP” CEREMONY
ON 16 DECEMBER 2005 AT 10.30 AM AT KEPPEL FELS, SINGAPORE


A very good morning,
- The Honourable Guest of Honour, Mr Yeo Cheow Tong, Minister for
   Transport for the Republic of Singapore
- Your Excellency Mr Joao Gualberto Marques Porto, Ambassador of
   Brazil to Singapore,
- Mr Renato Duque, Services Director of Petrobras
- Mr Jose Figueiredo, Executive Manager of Petrobras
- Mr Bernard Di Tullio, General Manager of Technip’s Oil & Gas
   Division
- Distinguished Guests and Colleagues.


Welcome to this morning’s ceremony as we celebrate our partnership
with Petrobras and Technip for the completion of the lower hull of P-52.
This is a major milestone for the US$775 million contract awarded by
Petrobras to the FSTP consortium comprising Keppel FELS, Keppel
FELS Brasil and Technip.


As we commemorate this milestone, the upper hull and topsides of P-52
are being built in our Brazilian yards in Niteroi and Angra.


P-52 is the second totally new production semi that we are constructing
for Petrobras since we built P-18 eleven years ago. When completed, P-
52 will be one of the world’s largest floating production platforms,
capable of producing oil and gas in water depths of 1,800m in the
Campos Basin.




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It will have an overall height of 101 m, and a deck area of 125 by 110 m.
To give us a sense of scale, the P-52 will be as tall as a 34-storey
apartment block and its upper deck will be ten times the area of a full-
size Olympic swimming pool.


As we gather here for this celebration, my mind goes back to
19 December 2003 when we signed the P-52 contract in the presence of
President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and the full Petrobras Board of
Directors.


During the ceremony, Mr Renato Duque said, “We had a challenge to
fulfil a national dream – to build part of the P-52 platform in Brazil, and
we have succeeded. We are confident that the Keppel-led consortium
will have good success on this project.”


Keppel is glad to participate in this national dream. It started around
2001 and 2002 with Brazil’s ambition to rejuvenate the offshore and
marine construction industry.


Through the encouragement and support from Petrobras, the State
Government of Rio and the Federal Government, we invested in
shipyards in Niteroi and Angra.


Since then, I am proud to say that over 3,000 jobs have been created.
The BrasFELS yard in Angra has completed several major projects
including three Anchor Handling Tugs/Supply vessels, which are the
largest to be built in the Southern Hemisphere. The Angra yard also
undertook the conversion of the FPSO, P-48, which was delivered to




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Petrobras with high standards of safety and quality. It won BrasFELS the
title of best shipyard contracted by Petrobras.


P-52, being one of the largest floating production semi, is an iconic
project. We won the contract in consortium with Technip. We were
tasked to meet Petrobras’ strict criteria of 60% local content. We
achieved that, while still providing innovative solutions at a competitive
price. Five months after securing the P-52 contract, Petrobras awarded
the FSTP consortium a similar production platform, P-51.


In the two years since the P-52 contract was awarded, we have
overcome various challenges through good teamwork. We look forward
to our next challenge in mating the lower hull and topside as well as the
mechanical completion and commissioning in Brazil.


Currently at our Keppel Shipyard Tuas yard is also the conversion of two
Floating Production Storage and Offloading facilities for Petrobras,
Capixaba and P-53. When these facilities are completed, together with
P-52 and P-51, Keppel would contribute an additional production
capacity of 640,000 barrels of oil per day to Brazil’s total oil production.


I am happy to announce that the column nodes of the P-51, which
Keppel FELS has just completed, have left the yard on 11 December.


As we celebrate the double achievements this morning, we celebrate
also the long-standing relationship between Petrobras and Keppel.


I would like to thank Mr Renato Duque and your distinguished delegation
from Petrobras for your presence here today.


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My special appreciation also goes to Minister Yeo Cheow Tong for
gracing this momentous milestone.


I would also like to acknowledge the project teams who have worked
hard on this project – Petrobras’ team led by Project Director Antonio
Carlos Justi, Project Manager Roberto Moro and Construction Manager
Flavio Siqueira; the Keppel FELS team led by Senior Project Managers,
Yeong Wai Seng and BH Woo and of course the FSTP team led by
Project Director Eduardo Nunez.


May I invite everyone to join me in giving the project team a big round of
applause for a job well done!


My gratitude also to all our sub-contractors, suppliers, surveyors and
underwriters who have toiled with us over many months in making today
possible.


Thank you.




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