The hull for Statoil's floating Åsgard B gas platform was launched from the dry dock at Daewoo Heavy Industries on 6 February.
Mechanical outfitting of this structure is now underway at the South Korean yard, including installation of tanks, fire pumps and lifts in all four support columns.
Plans call for the platform, which has no propulsion machinery of its own, to depart for Norway in mid-July. Probably using a barge, the tow is scheduled to take six weeks and to arrive in Stavanger on 1 September.
This will mark the start of an intensive period of work when hull and topsides are mated by Kværner Oil & Gas to create the world's largest gas floater.
Kværner's Stavanger yard has built the module support frame, with the modules coming from Kværner Egersund down the coast, Vigor Kværner in mid-Norway and sub-contractors at Ravenna and Arbatax in Italy.
These units will be shipped to Stavanger on barges and loaded onto the MSF. The living quarters is nearing completion at Emtunga in Sweden.
Åsgard B is due to be towed to the Åsgard-field in the Norwegian Sea in April 2000. Plans call for contractual gas deliveries to continental Europe to start on 1 October of the same year.
The platform will process gas and condensate from the Smørbukk, Smørbukk South and Midgard sub-fields. With a displacement of more than 80,000 tonnes, it has a deck area of 114 by 96 metres and can export 38 million cubic metres of gas per day.
This gas will be piped through Åsgard Transport to the Kårstø gas treatment complex north of Stavanger, and on through the new Europipe II trunkline to Emden in Germany.