Seatrium Sells its Texas Shipyard to Karpowership

 

Seatrium, the recently-merged combination of Singaporean rivals Keppel and Sembcorp Marine, has sold its American yard in Brownsville, Texas. The AmFELS facility, best known for building the offshore wind ship Charybdis, will now be owned by Turkish fossil-fueled powerplant builder Karpowership, a longtime partner and customer of Seatrium. 

AmFELS is a full-service offshore shipyard specializing in rig repairs, refits and Jones Act newbuilds. The transaction valued the AmFELS yard at just $50 million on an as-is basis. The terms are highly favorable for Karpowership: the transaction is effectively owner-financed for 12 months, with Karpowership paying only $10 million down at closing and the $40 million balance one year later. 

The deal is subject to typical closing conditions, including transfer of the underlying Port of Brownsville land lease to Karpowership's name. 

Seatrium said in a statement that it plans to keep its engineering R&D centers and business offices on the Gulf Coast.

The AmFELS-built Charybdis, delivered behind schedule and over budget, recently arrived off Virginia to enter service for Dominion Energy. The mega-WTIV will be installing wind turbines for Dominion, unless blocked by the Trump administration's new policy of shutting down offshore wind projects through regulatory action. The Trump administration has created a cabinet-level task force to review all wind farm permits, following the president's promise that as a matter of policy, "we don't allow windmills, we don't allow any windmills to go up."

Charybdis was the most iconic project on AmFELS' books, but others remain, and Seatrium said that it was committed to completing that work by the end of 2025.