ASCO opens $110m Darwin supply base

Perth-headquartered international oil and gas services firm ASCO Group has officially opened a $110 million supply base facility at Darwin Port.

ASCO Group has a 20-year contract with the NT government to manage the supply base, which has been designed to facilitate northern Australia becoming an international oil and gas hub.  

Features of the base include three working berths, 4,000 square metres of laydown area alongside each berth, heavy-lift crane facilities, open and undercover storage, office space and external worker facilities, and dangerous goods and waste transit bunds.

A drilling mud plant will also be relocated to the facility. 

NT chief minister Adam Giles was on hand for the opening today. 

ASCO said the supply base would provide long-term benefits to the territory and Australia’s oil and gas industry, with activity in the Timor Sea set to expand in the years ahead.

“We are very pleased with how things have been running since we had our first vessel, the Lady Melinda, tie up at the supply base at the end of June,” ASCO Australasia chief executive officer Matt Thomas said.

“Since then we have had more than 20 vessels come into the base and we are happy with how smoothly operations have gone and how well the layout of the supply base works.”

He said a number of international oil and gas companies, including ConocoPhillips, Eni, INPEX and Shell, would be supporting their offshore operations from Darwin’s east arm logistics precinct and the supply base would be the critical link in their supply chains.

Established in Aberdeen in the late 1960s, ASCO provides field support services in the oil and gas field with a specialty in marine supply base management.

The company manages bases in the UK, Norway, Tanzania, Trinidad and east Canada.

“ASCO is bringing all of that experience and expertise into supporting management of the Darwin Marine Supply Base,” Mr Thomas said.