Maersk Wins Decom at North Sea Field

Two subsidiaries of Denmark’s Maersk Drilling have won a contract to decommission London-based Perenco’s Thames gas field in the North Sea.

Maersk Decom and Maersk Supply Service will together oversee the removal, recycling and waste management of subsea infrastructure, the former said in a statement on September 2. The work includes the cut and recovery of wellheads and wellhead protection structures, as well as end-to-end recycling and waste management.

Maersk Decom was set up in April last year as a joint venture between Maersk Supply Service and Maersk Drilling, to provide decommissioning services to the offshore energy industry.

“This is an important milestone for Maersk Decom, being the first project that moves our new company from studies and project development into execution,” Maersk Decom CEO Lars Banke said.

The Thames gas field halted production in 2015 almost three decades after its launch. The connecting Thames pipeline is set to flow gas once more, however, after being acquired last year by London-listed Independent Oil & Gas (IOG). It will be used to pump gas from IOG’s discoveries in the area to the onshore Bacton terminal.