PetroSA’S Ikhwezi Project helps a small Cape Town Company Realize Dream of Owning Metallurgical Testing Lab
One of the positive spin-offs of PetroSA’s Project Ikhwezi is a new metallurgical testing laboratory for One Eighty Degrees, a Western Cape-based company involved in industrial metal and chemical testing.
One Eight Degrees' dream of building this type of laboratory would not have been possible had it not been for PetroSA’s Project Ikhwezi. Many local and foreign companies have been awarded multi-million rands worth of contracts for various works on the project.
Due to the offshore aspect of the project, a number of contracts have been awarded to foreign suppliers with imported content of more than $10million. In accordance with the Department of Trade and Industry's National Industrial Participation Programme (NIPP), such contracts triggered the NIPP application. One such contract was with Allseas.
Allseas is a global leader in off-shore pipeline installation and sub-sea construction, specialized in laying steel pipelines on the bottom of the sea.
The DTI stipulates, through NIPP, that all non-BEE compliant suppliers source up to 30 percent of their contracts' supplies in South Africa. Altogether 16 Ikhwezi contracts resulted in NIPP obligations, which will benefit the SA economy.
The NIPP is administered by the DTI through its Industrial Participation Secretariat (IPS).
Before DTI pointed suggested One Eighty Degrees as a potential beneficiary of Allseas' PetroSA contract, One Eighty Degrees already had a plan in place to develop a laboratory in the Western Cape.
The laboratory, which will enable One Eighty Degrees to play a significant role in the industry metal testing, was built by Allseas, a Dutch company contracted by PetroSA to construct and lay the sub-sea pipeline linking the offshore F-O wells to the F-A platform , PetroSA’s existing offshore gas facility.
Mr. Everton September, PetroSA’s Vice President of New Ventures: Upstream, described the new laboratory as an important achievement by the three parties involved.
“PetroSA, working together with the Department of Trade and Industry and Allseas, has provided this small company engaged in metal testing with a good opportunity to expand.
“PetroSA is determined to ensure that the impact of Project Ikhwezi is not limited to sustaining the operations of the GTL refinery, but that it also assists local companies to reach their full potential and create more jobs in the country,” said Mr. September.
Allseas’ Mr. Jan de Boer said that, in preparation for the pipelay on PetroSA's Project Ikhwezi, his company has performed a lot of chemical and mechanical testing to qualify PetroSA's welding procedures for the pipelay activity.
Mr. De Boer is optimistic that similar tests can be done in One Eighty Degrees’ laboratory in future.
‘This laboratory is now equipped for the regular chemical and mechanical testing done in the more and more demanding industry,” says Mr. de Boer.
Allseas is currently doing the pipelay for PetroSA using a specially-designed ship called Audacia.
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