Petroleo Brasileiro, owner of the Western Hemisphere's largest oil discovery in three decades, plans to order 40 drilling ships and platforms worth about $30 billion for delivery by 2017.
The deep-water drilling ships and semi-submersible rigs will explore for oil and gas in seas up to three kilometres deep, Petrobras, as the Rio de Janeiro-based company is known, said in a statement.
The vessels cost about $750 million each, said J. Michael Drickamer, an oilfield service company analyst at Morgan Keegan & Co. in Memphis, Tennessee.
Petrobras, Brazil's state-controlled oil producer, plans to spend $112 billion through 2012 to help increase its oil and natural gas production and expand its refining and distribution operations. The discovery of five-billion to eight-billion-barrel Tupi field and the possibility of other large fields nearby, may require even more spending on offshore equipment, according to chief financial officer Almir Barbassa.
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Petrobas: 40 Drilling Ships & Platforms
Petroleo Brasileiro, owner of the Western Hemisphere's largest oil discovery in three decades, plans to order 40 drilling ships and platforms worth about $30 billion for delivery by 2017
