Tullow Oil is reducing how much its Jubilee floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel can rotate after discovering an issue with the vessel's turret bearing.
The Kwame Nkrumah FPSO vessel, which started production from the field, 60km offshore Ghana, in 2010, is a converted tanker with 120,000 b/d capacity.
Following a recent inspection of the turret area of the vessel by SOFEC, the original turret manufacturer, the potential issue with the turret bearing was identified. Tullow has not described the nature of the issue, but says, as a precautionary measure, additional operating procedures to monitor the turret bearing and reduce the degree of rotation of the vessel are being put in place.
SOFEC is now due to undertake further offshore examinations and Tullow will work with SOFEC to determine what further measures will be required. Oil production and gas export is continuing as normal.
The 3 billion bbl Jubilee field was discovered in 2007 by Kosmos Energy by the Mahogany-1 (M-1) and Hyedua-1 (H-1) exploration wells. It was one of the largest oil finds that year.
Average production in 2014 was 102,000 b/d, but last year that was constrained to about 65,000 b/d in July due to issues with the gas compression system on board.
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