Mauritania – Tortue LNG project

The project
Tortue LNG stands for the Greater Tortue Ahmeyim (GTA) project, an offshore LNG project in the waters between Mauritania and Senegal. The project involves the construction of a floating LNG plant in open sea and deep water. To protect the facility from the long swells at the West African coast, it will be protected by a 1 km long caisson breakwater in a water depths exceeding 30m.

Bontrup scope
Bontrup supplied Widegrade® to its client Eiffage for the breakwater foundation. Widegrade® is produced at Bremanger Quarry and was transported to the transhipment location in Mauritania via feeder vessels. There, it was transferred to Bontrup's self-unloading bulk carrier, the mv Bontrup Pearl. This vessel served as a Floating Transfer Station throughout the project, loading the fallpipe vessel with new rock via its conveyor belt system whenever it returned from site.

This two-wayship-to-ship operation was successfully completed, thanks also to careful preparation and specialized MetOcean andShip Motion studies. Based on these calculations, the best transshipment location was selected and a robust mooring system was designed.