Subsea 7 is on target to open its new pipeline fabrication spoolbase in Port Isabel, Texas, in June 2009.

Construction on the buildings and quayside is on schedule and nearing completion. Welding on the facility's first project, a 58km pipeline for Marathon's Droshky development, will begin in early June with an opening ceremony for the base planned for late July.

The state-of-the-art spoolbase, located in Brownsville, Texas is 1.5km in length (1.2km stalk rack and 0.3km fabrication building). It will enable Subsea 7 to offer an enhanced deepwater rigid pipelay service to clients in the North America region. The spoolbase will fabricate and store oil and gas pipelines of up to 20" diameter (16" steel plus 4" insulation coatings) in lengths of up to 1.2km for spooling onto reeled pipelay vessels.

The facility will be equipped to weld any steel line pipe material from traditional carbon steel to exotic material solutions. In addition, the base will be able to complete the fabrication of plastic-lined pipelines, pipe-in-pipe systems and steel catenary risers.

Ian Cobban, Vice President - North America for Subsea 7 stated: "With the predicted volumes of oil and gas production in the North America region being delivered through subsea facilities, our ability to fabricate and install high quality pipelines locally will be an important competitive edge for Subsea 7. This is a very exciting development for the company, and allows us to expand upon the significant infrastructure that we have already established in the United States. With the major investment we've made in the Port Isabel spoolbase, we are building upon our vision to become the Subsea Partner of Choice in our sector and are fully committed to the Gulf of Mexico and the entire North America region."

Tags: Subsea 7