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January 16th, 2006
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Buenos Aires Argentina - Intesar wins Puerto Madryn-Pico Truncado construction contract
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| Argentina's President Néstor Kirchner signed a 381mn-peso (US$125mn) contract on Thursday with local power equipment supplier Integración Eléctrica Sur Argentino (Intesar) to build a 500kV transmission line linking Puerto Madryn and Pico Truncado in Santa Cruz province, local media reported. The line will stretch 543km and the contract includes a transformer station in Santa Cruz Norte from 500kV to 132kV and a 132kV line linking Santa Cruz Norte and the existing Pico Truncado transformer, local papers reported. The Puerto Madryn-Pico Truncado line is a continuation of the 500kV Choele Choel-Puerto Madryn line that started operations in December 2005. Construction should take 22 months and operations are scheduled for November 2007. The tender for the line was in three parts: he supply of the cables, the towers and the construction itself, which was awarded to Intesar, federal planning minister Julio De Vido said at a press conference. The energy ministry awarded Italy's Pirelli and Argentine company IMSA a 72mn pesos worth of contracts to supply aluminum wires and local firms Torres Americanas, Guzmán Nacich and Seire a 26mn-peso contract to provide the towers. The tender was divided in parts to increase the local participation in the project. "The cables and towers will be built in Argentina by Argentinecompanies," De Vido said.
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December 14th, 2005
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Hamilton Ontario - Players at Toronto's Bay Street Casino likely to loose their bet on Stelco.
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| I am not talking about the widows and orphans or the retirees that may have lost their life savings because they were taken in by the glossy annual reports that are the hallmark of poorly managed corporations. Stelco has been on the slippery slope to insolvency since the erection of the Stelco Ivory Tower. Built 1973 to glorify management and financed by tax payers as part of Hamilton's multiphase urban revitalization project. The Stelco executives has since been forced to move to more humble dwellings following the removal of the trade barriers that gave the company a virtual monopoly on wire rod and power to decide who would be allowed to buy rod and operate a wire mill in Canada and what markets and customers they could supply. Potential pipe producers may have encountered similar problems. This tranquil colonial paradise was rivaled only by South Africa's Iscor and Australia's BHP.The "loosers" I am talking about is a group of speculating investors who picked up Stelco shares after it filed for bankruptcy protection 2 years ago.
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December 9th, 2005
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St. Louis Missouri - Copperfield acquires International Wire Group Assets.
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| International Wire Group, Inc. (Pink Sheets: ITWG), announced today the sale and lease of selected assets of its U.S. insulated wire manufacturing facilities and distribution center to Copperfield LLC, headquartered in Bremen, Indiana. Proceeds from the transaction and collections from existing trade receivables will be used to reduce amounts outstanding under our senior revolving credit facility and for general corporate purposes. The Company's foreign insulated wire operations located in Durango, Mexico and Cebu, Philippines will be unaffected by the transaction. Rodney D. Kent, Chief Executive Officer, stated "In addition to strengthening our balance sheet, this transaction will help facilitate our continued focus on growing key areas within our core bare wire markets." Mr. Kent added, "The Company's Board of Directors has asked Rothschild Inc. (who facilitated the announced transaction) to assist the Board in evaluating strategic alternatives for the remaining foreign insulated wire operations."
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November 28th, 2005
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Guangzhou China - China to develop 800-kv extra high-voltage transmission project
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| China Southern Power Grid Company is set to build an 800-kv extra high-voltage direct current transmission line, which is expected to be in full operation by 2010. Sources from the company said the transmission line will span the provinces of Yunnan and Guangzhou in south China, with designed transmission capacity hitting between 5 million kw and 6.4 million kw. The extra high- voltage transmission project is suitable for long-distance electricity transmission which can reach as far as 2,000 km, the company said. The China Southern Power Grid Company mainly covers the southern provinces of Yunnan, Guizhou, Hainan, Guangdong and Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, which are expected to consume 434.4 billion kwh of electricity in 2005, about 1.89 times that ofthe year 2000. To meet the rising demand for electricity in the southern regions, the company plans to develop a huge power grid network with 8 alternating and 5direct current transmission passages by the year 2010. In addition, the China Southern Power Grid Company will also provide Vietnam with annual electricity supply of 1.3 billion kwh in a purchase term of ten years starting from January 2007, the company said.
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September 12th, 2005
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Stuttgart - Warning CWTP Stuttgart 2005, Stuttgart, Germany is cancelled
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| Mack Brooks adviced us this morning that the CWTP 2005 an international conference and exhibition for cable, wire, tube, & pipe production, processing and applications that was to open tomorrow September 13th has been cancelled.
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August 25th, 2005
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Beijing - Tisco gets 10 billion Yuan (US$1.2 Billion) credit line for stainless steel project
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| The Bank of China and China Development Bank have signed an agreement to offer 10 billion yuan in loans to Taiyuan Iron and Steel (Group) Co Ltd (Tisco) to fund a 1.5 million ton-capacity stainless steel project, the Financial News reported, without citing sources. The newspaper said the Bank of China, one of the big four state-owned commercial banks, will provide loans of six billion yuan and the China Development Bank will contribute the remaining four billion. Upon completion of the project, the Shanxi-based iron and steel producer will have an annual stainless steel production capacity of three million tons, allowing it to become internationally competitive, the newspaper added.
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August 24th, 2005
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Brantford Ontario - Global trade is sometimes like shipping coal to New Castle.
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| This is not a wire, cable or tube related news item, in fact it is not even a news item, but worth relating anyhow. Canada is supposedly known for its vast timber resources and its large wood processing industry. I was therefore somewhat surprised when procuring a hardwood floor to find that the parquet was made in China from oakwood grown in Russia and distributed by a company in Lancaster Pennsylvania. With unemployment in Canada below 4% and the price of oil over US$ 60 a barrel the Canadian lumberjacks are heading west to the Alberta oil sands.
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August 20th, 2005
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New York - More corruption revealed at UN procurement office
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| As if the Iraq oil for food scandal was not enough to change the public conception of this wasteful shrine of political nepotism Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Wednesday that the United Nations is beefing up surveillance of its procurement department after a top official was accused of shaking down contractors for nearly $1 million. Alexander Yakovlev, a veteran purchasing official is accused of getting about $1 million in illegal payments from the winners of UN contracts worth $79 million. Yakovlev was arrested on Monday and pleaded guilty in a federal court in New York to conspiracy, wire fraud and money laundering charges. The charges were based on evidence gathered in an internal investigation by the UN Office of Internal Oversight Services, and UN officials said that probe was widening. Annan said he planned to meet with his new undersecretary-general for management, Christopher Burnham, later in the week to discuss new procurement safeguards. The UN procurement office annually purchase billions of dollars worth of power cables, optic fiber communication cables weld-mesh, pipe and re-bar for the many infrastructure projects UN:s various aid agencies are involved in.
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August 17th, 2005
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New Delhi - Mittal teams up with ONGC to make big global acquisitions
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| This could well turn out to be India’s energy blockbuster. Global steel tycoon LN Mittal is joining hands with petro biggie ONGC to float an energy consortium for overseas acquisitions. The final agreement on the consortium is expected to be signed shortly. While this signals the beginning of India’s highest profit-making company, the $14 billion ONGC group, moving into the big league, for the world’s largest steelmaker the $22 billion LNM group, it’s a move from steel to a whole new world of oil and gas. The joint consortium will seek to acquire overseas equity in oil and energy-related businesses like energy trading and shipping. The details of the deal, which is currently a hush-hush matter, are currently being worked out between the two companies before the final deal is signed. The joint venture consortium, expected to be registered in a EU country, will seek to concentrate primarily in countries where the LNM group has established its presence.
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August 15th, 2005
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Hong Kong - New mills spell trouble for steel sector
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| China's pledge to strip out excess capacity is not enough to restore long-term confidence in the world's fastest-growing steel industry, but strong raw material prices have at least halted two months of steep losses. Iron ore prices from India, often seen as a barometer of China's steel sector, are up 18 percent last month after almost halving in May and June, analysts and traders said. Steel prices in China have recovered 5-10 percent. But even as Beijing moves to shut down capacity equal to last year's entire steel output of the United States, new mills are starting up in a country that has more than 800. Mainland economic growth in excess of 9 percent has driven steel to record highs in the last year, adding to costs for carmakers. But as supply has grown, prices of some grades retreated up to 30 percent from February. June crude steel output was slightly less than in May but in line with April. Output in the first half rose 28.2 percent to 165 million metric tons. Large investments have led to a spate of new mills in China, which has only managed to close its smallest, least efficient plants - capacity easily replaced by huge new factories. ``Supply is increasing more rapidly at the moment. Everybody has an incentive to produce more, to some extent, because they get more revenues, even at lower prices,'' John Johnson, China chief representative for CRU International, said.
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July 6th, 2005
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Beijing - Strong investment by Westerners in China's booming cable industry.
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| A growing amount of foreign money is flowing into China's expanding power cable market, as overseas investors are trying to cash in on the highly lucrative sector. Fuelled by the hefty investments in China's industrial sectors, such as power, communications and transportation, the soaring demand for cable products in the world's fastest-growing economy promises vast opportunities for cable makers. In an attempt to ease the power shortages, which have long plagued China, the country's major power grid builders including State Grid Corp of China and South China Grid are taking strenuous efforts to strengthen the energy-hungry economy's power-distribution networks. China's largest power web weaver, State Grip Corp, vows to pump 107 billion yuan (US$13 billion) nationwide this year to build and repair grids. Sources from the China Electric Equipment Industry Association (CEEIA) say the world's cable industry currently boasts a business of US$80 billion, and Asia takes a 37-per-cent share, in which China marks an overwhelming contributor.
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July 5th, 2005
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Essen Germany - ThyssenKrupp to reduce production of stainless steel
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| Handelsblatt the German business daily said Friday that the steel and engineering group ThyssenKrupp is planning to reduce its production of stainless steel by metric 120,000 tons in the third quarter. This corresponds to 20 per cent of the company's overall production of stainless steel. The company says that there has been a drop in demand, as customers have built up large stocks. The announcement is inline with similar announcement by Posco (see news item below) and Arcelor (see news item below)
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July 1st, 2005
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Shanghai - Copper futures drop further despite strong fundamentals
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| Copper futures staged a second straight day-long decline Thursday in Asia as investors shunned underlying fundamental support for industrial metals, betting the decline would accelerate in more active floor trading later in the day. The downturn in copper pushed the entire base metals complex lower on the day, though most other three-month contracts showed only modest declines. The three-month London Metal Exchange copper was down US$40 (HK$312) from the late kerb to US$3,315/US$3,320 a tonne. The latest sell-off followed price declines of more than US$30 a tonne in Tuesday's Asian session and again in more active LME floor trades.``Copper is starting to appear less bullish, particularly among the funds, which are starting to think it's time to get out,'' said Commonwealth Bank of Australia commodities specialist David Thurtell. The declines have further distanced copper from its recent all-time high of US$3,435 a tonne. Traders said speculation was mounting that one or more large holders of off-warrant copper would soon deposit the metal on the LME, reversing a steady decline that has left inventories at their lowest in three decades. The cash to three-month backwardation was at US$239/US$249 in Asia after ending at US$230/250 Tuesday.
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June 30th, 2005
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- SKF cites price pressure from US automakers for factory closures
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| Ball bearing producer SKF said in a media release yesterday that they were relocating their factory in Aiken North Carolina and the factory in Springfield South Dakota to Puebla, and Guadalajara Mexico, respectively.
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June 29th, 2005
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Minneapolis Minnesota - Nortech Systems names Louis J. Fournier General Manager of Commercial Wire Products
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| Nortech Systems, a provider of electronics manufacturing services (EMS), has named Louis J. Fournier as General Manager, Commercial Wire Products, in charge of the company's facilities in Bemidji, Minn., and Monterrey, Mexico. "We're very pleased to add an experienced executive of Lou's caliber to Nortech's management team," says Mike Degen, President and Chief Executive Officer of Nortech Systems. "He will oversee a new, streamlined organizational structure designed to improve our customer focus." Fournier brings Nortech an impressive, broad-based background across many disciplines, including procurement, foreign sourcing, operations and sales. His office will be in Bemidji.
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June 25th, 2005
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Beijing - Chinese government to improve market information system
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| The General Office of the Ministry of Commerce (MOC) issued a circular recently, unveiling a study and investigation into the supply and demand and price trend of 300 kinds of major capital goods in the latter half of this year. The sectors to be investigated this time include nonferrous metal, construction materials, energy, iron and steel, coal, coke, finished oil products, diesel oil and chemical products. Aim of the investigation is to probe into the situation of supply and demand and price trend of the 300 kinds of major capital goods in the latter half of this year, as well as to consider for such factors as mutual interaction of the international and domestic market, production capacity, output level, fungible of production cycle, cost and inventory, technical renovation, and transportation. As a key sector to be investigated into, steel industry has more than 50 kinds of products, including section, rod, wire rods, plate and strip and tubing, listed among the list to be investigated into.
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June 18th, 2005
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New York - Former Tyco chiefs heading for the slammer
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| Former Tyco executives Dennis Kozlowski and Mark Swartz were on Friday facing up to 25 years in jail after they were found guilty of grand larceny, conspiracy, securities fraud and falsifying business records a comprehensive victory for the government's crackdown on scandals in corporate America.
Mr Kozlowski, ex-chief executive, and Mr Swartz, his chief financial officer, were convicted in New York State Supreme Court of 22 of 23 counts including stealing up to $157m in unauthorised compensation. The jury found them guilty, after 11 days of deliberations, of securities fraud under New York's general business law by gaining about $400m from share sales under false pretences. Both men were also found guilty of all but one count of falsifying business records. Grand larceny carries a sentence of up to 25 years. Sentencing was provisionally set for August 2.
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June 11th, 2005
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Toronto Ontario - Inco sapproached by 3 stainless steel makers anxious to secure supply
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| Inco Ltd. has recently been approached by three stainless steel producers, including one large Chinese player, keen to do some type of deal to tie up a supply of nickel from the world's second biggest nickel miner, Inco said on Wednesday. "We have actually had three (approaches) from three different countries," Peter Jones, Inco's chief operating officer and president told the Reuters Mining Summit in New York. He did not elaborate on their identities but did say that one overture was from a "large" Chinese stainless steel company and that Inco was interested in doing supply-type deals. "It makes sense for us to have some sort of tie up with major consumers," he said. Stainless steel is nickel's biggest end use, with about two-thirds of global output going into that market.
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June 2nd, 2005
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Guilford Connecticut - Wire Association sees cross the board business upturn
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| During the recent Interwire exhibition Mark Marcelli editor of Wire Journal International as is his custom interviewed a number of visitors. "While 2 years ago most people I talked to were attending the show merely "to look", Marcelli said, this year I found that most people I talked to were at Interwire for specific reasons. They had a shopping list and people to see. I also noted a trend where people come to the show for fewer days. The groups I talked to by and large were there for one day or two at most. They had very defined missions. Not quite the days of the week-long stays hopping from hospitalty suite to hospitality suite at night", he said. For a full press release from the show use this link For photos from the show use this link
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May 21st, 2005
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Atlanta Georgia - Internet penetration in Asia makes leading Wire&Cable portal viable marketing venue.
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| www.wireworld.com the leading global wire & cable portal celebrated its 10th anniversary since its inauguration in 1995 at the recently concluded Interwire2005. The portal now reaches an average audience of 30000 each month and has over 18000 registered subscribers to its specialty section that features the industry's most comprehensive trade index and wire & cable industry e-mail directory. Statistics of internet penetration in Asia (use this link) tells a clear tale why the internet portal is able to provide such an effective direct access for suppliers to the expanding wire & cable industry in Asia and Russia.
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May 14th, 2005
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Bangkok Thailand - Millennium Steel projects robust sales
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| Millennium Steel Plc, Thailand's largest long steel producer, expects sales to reach 20 billion baht this year, a 25% increase from the 16 billion baht registered last year, due mainly to increased local demand, according to president Santi Charnkolrawee. He said Millennium Steel's sales volume was forecast to rise to 1.15 million tons, up from 900,000 tons last year. The increase in sales would be in line with rising local demand which is forecast to grow 8% per year over the next five years on the back of the government's massive expenditure in infrastructure projects worth around 1.4 trillion baht. Millennium Steel plans to raise its production output of high-grade products, which will provide higher sales margins. The proportion of high-grade products is targeted to be 50% of the company's total output in 2009. It now stands at 14%.
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April 18th, 2005
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London - Copper topples from record high as speculators take their chips off the table
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| Base metals dropped sharply this week as investment funds thought the rally in metals prices to multi-year highs had gone far enough – at least for now. Copper was under pressure, falling 6 per cent from a new record nominal high of $3,360 a tonne on the London Metal Exchange at the start of the week. China is expected next week to report lower copper imports for the month of March, next week, which is an indication of slowing copper consumption growth. In addition, Juan Villarzu, chief executive of Codelco, the Chilean state-owned miner and the world’s largest copper producer, warned that high copper prices were “unsustainable”. His warning came only days after the Chilean Copper Commission increased its 2005 forecast for average copper prices to between $1.33 and $1.37 a pound, or $3,014 a ton, up more than 20 percent from its October estimates. At the CRU 4th World Copper Conference in Santiago on Thursday, two senior copper analysts disagreed over the future of copper prices. To access CRU group web site use this link
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March 24th, 2005
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- Stelax gets breakthrough contract for Stainless rebar technology.
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| Stelax International Ltd. and Stelax Industries Ltd. announced Wednesday that Stelax had received the largest contract yet awarded, 6.4 million lbs. of stainless rebar, for the Stonecutters Bridge in Hong Kong with a value of Euro 8.5 million (approximately U.S. $11,000,000). Stelax International Ltd. was awarded the contract number by the Maeda-Hitachi-Yokogawa-Hsin Chong J.V., which was secured through Stelax Hong Kong agents for NUOVINOX(TM) and stainless steel rebar, Concord Holdings. The first test delivery was dispatched in December 2004. The Stonecutters Bridge project, estimated by the Hong Kong Highway Department to cost HK$ 5 billion, is expected to be open by the end of 2008.
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March 19th, 2005
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Paris - Nexans wins a contract worth around 22 million Euros
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| Nexans, has been awarded a project worth around 22 million Euros for trenching services, by Hydro as operator for the Ormen Lange licence group, for two MEG (Mono Ethylene Glycol) pipelines and two umbilical cables serving the undersea gas field on the continental shelf around 120 km off the coast of Norway. The MEG pipelines and umbilical cables will link Ormen Lange’s subsea production stations, at a depth of 1,100 m, to the onshore gas processing facility at Nyhamna, on the west coast of Norway. Nexans will use its own specially developed Capjet waterjetting system to bury them, to a depth of one meter in the seabed, for protection against accidental impacts and marine activities. The contract covers trenching of two 6 inch MEG pipelines and two umbilicals, each line being approximately 122 km long, as well as trenching of one in-field MEG pipeline and umbilical cable, each approximately 3.5 km in length. The trenching work will be carried out during the summer of 2006 with two Capjet systems operating in parallel from two vessels. There will also be trenching performed in 2007. The Ormen Lange gas field was discovered by Hydro in 1997 and is the largest gas field under development on the Norwegian continental shelf. The reservoir is around 40 km long and eight km wide, and approximately 3,000 m below the surface of the sea.
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