Offshore drilling contractor Noble Corporation has received a contract award for a jack-up drilling rig in Qatar.

The company reported in its latest fleet status report on Thursday that the jack-up drilling rig Noble Houston Colbert has been awarded a contract by JX Nippon in Qatar.

The contract, with an undisclosed dayrate, will start in December 2016 and last until May 2017. Noble Houston Colbert has been warm stacked at a shipyard in the UAE since July 2016. The unit previously worked for Total in Argentina until June 2016.

Noble Corporation wins contract award for a jack-up drilling rig in Qatar

Noble Houston Colbert

The rig, of a Friede & Goldman JU3000N design, was built in 2014 by Sembcorp Marine’s Jurong Shipyard.

Noble said in the report that four of its jack-up drilling rigs are expected to experience a number of days of operational downtime, all at zero dayrate.

Noble Scott Marks is anticipated to have +/-30 days of operational downtime for maintenance/ repairs in 1Q 2017 and Noble Gene House is also expected to have +/-30 days of operational downtime regulatory inspection in 3Q 2017.

Further, Noble Roger Lewis is anticipated to experience +/-15 days of operational downtime for regulatory inspection in 1Q 2017.

And finally, Noble Joe Beall is anticipated to experience +/-90 days of operational downtime at zero dayrate for regulatory inspection in 1Q 2017.

Source: Offshore Energy Today