Solships - Solstad Offshore ASA Solships 55th edition | Page 26

Market outlook

Every day and every year represent new challenges and new opportunities . While COVID has been the headache since March 2020 , this year was initially representing a more normalization of the market . This of course changed dramatically in February with the Russian invasion of Ukraine .
Norway
The Norwegian PSV fleet has during 2022 mainly been tied up on term contracts . We won a contract with ConocoPhillips who chose to extend the 3 incumbent Solstad PSVs they have on hire ; Fortune , Server and Supporter ; to 2027 with 3 yearly options . Equinor declared a yearly option on Searcher , whilst Naley and Falnes concluded their long term charter with Wintershall Dea during the summer and have worked in the spot market since . In addition , Normand Arctic had a short spell in the spot market during the winter after completing a term contract with Aker BP before supporting OKEA for the summer before going full circle and back to Aker BP for 15 months firm from September .
For our AHTS fleet , the year has once again been a roller coaster ride , with day rates varying from NOK 80k to NOK 2mill + per day for rig moves in the North Sea spot market . In addition , we continue to secure our favored AHTS fleet on project work scopes both in and outside the North Sea . Amongst the scopes were mooring line repairs , ocean fish farm tow-in as the first Windstaller work scope , ploughing , floating wind farm tow and hook-up in addition to FPSO hook-up and subsequent riser recovery .
We also had an extensive towing scope of a large LNG plant in Russia lined up this summer for Drott , but this was cancelled for obvious reasons . If anything , we experienced that Solstad as an organization have robust procedures in place related to various sanctions affecting operations and contractual obligations .
If we once again are going to look into the crystal ball on what we expect going forward it is safe to say that the market conditions look bright in the years to come with increasing demand and activity paired with a fairly stable fleet with no new vessels being built at the moment . As we see increased demand in all regions ,
KENNETH LANDE
Office : Skudeneshavn
Title : EVP AHTS & PSV
we are trying to make our close clients understand that they can expect higher rates but also that they need to move fairly swiftly in order to secure the tonnage to cover their demand in coming years .
The green shift is still happening as we speak , but due to a very unstable world where a lot is circling around energy security , we expect that the pursuit of fossil fuels will increase again which in turn once again will lead to a favorable market for the oil service industry .
UK Market
The UK OSV Market continued to build on the improvements seen in 2021 with increased demand , utilization , and day rates seen across the Solstad Offshore Fleet during 2022 . The client base also saw improvements , and Solstad Offshore now supports 10 different clients on a term basis : CNR ; Enquest ; Equinor ; Harbour Energy ; Ithaca Energy ; Neptune Energy ; Peterson Den Helder ; Petrofac ; Repsol Sinopec ; and TAQA . Peterson Den Helder and Petrofac are both new clients for the UK office when it comes to PSV support . With 15 PSVs now on term contract in the UK Sector , Solstad Offshore holds around 20 % of the market share . In addition , there are two PSVs trading the spot market , meaning 17 PSVs are operated from the UK office .
During the first half of the year , the last remaining PSVs in layup ( Normand Tantalus and Normand Triumph ) were reactivated . Normand Tantalus , once reactivated ,
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