Focus on innovation
Fincantieri has announced the signing of an agreement to define plans for a drillship featuring frontline innovation and technology, and the securing of a contract to build a semisubmersible floating platform for the transportation of nuclear submarine reactor compartments.
Fincantieri will work together with the Krylov State Research Centre, one of the world’s most prestigious naval research centres, on a project to develop a drill ship able to operate in particularly difficult conditions, in full respect of the environment and crew safety. This highly advanced vessel will be able to navigate in ice up to 1.5 metres thick and ambient temperatures of -40C and will have a 4-month operational autonomy.
In order to explore types of cooperation in different areas of shipbuilding, in July this year Fincantieri and the Krylov Centre signed a framework agreement spanning several sectors, including the offshore one. Just four months later, the two companies are reaping the first major tangible rewards of this undertaking, in the form of the memorandum signed.
The agreement is of great importance for two reasons. Firstly, because the steady retreat of artic sea ice will allow access over the medium to long term to vast hydrocarbon reserves, of great interest to the major international oil companies. In fact, in the absence of appropriate technology, low temperatures and the presence of ice have been the major obstacles up until now to accessing these resources.
But there is another aspect, which opens up very important opportunities for Fincantieri in response to ever-growing demand from the oil & gas market (involving the extraction and production of oil and natural gas): in fact, by 2030 Russia plans to buy dozens of vessels like those covered by the agreement, with unit values possibly in excess of USD 1 billion.
