Post by bjspokanimal on Apr 17, 2024 9:56:06 GMT -5
The CEO of Noble Energy was asked about newbuilds in an interview this morning and he reiterated the thoughts that he expressed last fall. It would take a dayrate of $600 to $650k or more for the next 10 years to support building a new drillship from scratch. A new drillship would cost $750 million to one billion to build and 4 years to build it. He said their are no plans for a newbuild, acknowledging that dayrates at nearly $500k are well below what's needed for newbuilds to be feasible.
My own opinion, based on what it's been costing to buy and launch stranded ships like Aquila or build rigs like Atlas and Titan, is that it would cost $1 to $1.1 billion to build a 7th generation ship with a 1,400 ST main hoist hookload and $1.2 to $1.3 billion for an 8th generation rig with a 1,700 ST hookload. Outfitting either ship class with one 20k psi BOP in place of a 15k psi BOP would require an additional $75 to $100 million as part of the construction process (it would cost much more to retrofit an existing rig with a 20k BOP). Transocean CEO Jeremy Thigpen made it clear in his recent cc that reactivating one of the company's stacked rigs is far more feasible than a newbuild from scratch and that the stacked ships have been well preserved. Customer negotiations have shown no stomach for the kinds of financial commitments that would be necessary to justify a scratch newbuild anytime soon.
My own opinion, based on what it's been costing to buy and launch stranded ships like Aquila or build rigs like Atlas and Titan, is that it would cost $1 to $1.1 billion to build a 7th generation ship with a 1,400 ST main hoist hookload and $1.2 to $1.3 billion for an 8th generation rig with a 1,700 ST hookload. Outfitting either ship class with one 20k psi BOP in place of a 15k psi BOP would require an additional $75 to $100 million as part of the construction process (it would cost much more to retrofit an existing rig with a 20k BOP). Transocean CEO Jeremy Thigpen made it clear in his recent cc that reactivating one of the company's stacked rigs is far more feasible than a newbuild from scratch and that the stacked ships have been well preserved. Customer negotiations have shown no stomach for the kinds of financial commitments that would be necessary to justify a scratch newbuild anytime soon.