KCA Deutag awarded $1-billion BP maintenance contract

BP has awarded UK services company KCA Deutag two contracts on Thursday, both in the Caspian Sea and with a total value of $1 billion for operations, maintenance and engineering work.

The first of the contracts are for operations and maintenance services for platforms in the East, West and Central Azeri, Deepwater Guneshli, West Chirag, Chirag, and Shah Deniz installations. The second is for engineering support services for drilling packages in the Caspian Sea.

BP has been plagued by declining output at the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli oilfields throughout 2015, averaging of 641,000 barrels of oil per day in August, down from 646,000 bopd for the same period in 2014 and 661,000 bopd in the first quarter of 2015.

The announcement of maintenance work follows the deadly collapse of a platform operated by State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Republic, better known as SOCAR, in early December. There, seven workers were killed, with 23 still missing as of December 16, 2015.

BP announced on December 7, 2015 that its operations in Azerbaijan were unaffected by the incident.

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