10-02-09 Mitsubishi, Japan's largest trading house, and Brazil's state-controlled Petroleo Brasileiro (Petrobras) will build an $ 830 mm ship to drill in deep seas for crude oil and natural gas.
The vessel would be capable of drilling in ocean depths of 3,000 meters (9,843 feet), Mitsubishi said. A South Korean shipbuilder has been chosen to build the vessel, a Mitsubishi spokesman said.

Oil and gas explorers, having already tapped shallow-water reserves, are searching for the fuel in deep-sea wells, increasing the need for drilling vessels that can reach deposits far below the ocean.
A joint venture between Mitsubishi and Petrobras, as Brazil's biggest oil company is known, will own and operate the vessel, to be completed in June 2010. Petrobras will use the new ship at its deep-sea oil and gas reserves at home and abroad, Mitsubishi said.

Japan's government in 2005 built the yen 60 bn ($ 656 mm) deep-sea drilling ship named "Chikyu," meaning the earth, to study the geological structure underthe sea bed. Chikyu is able to drill 7,000 meters below the ocean floor in depths of 2,500 meters.
Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding built the body of the Chikyu while Mitsubishi Heavy Industries made drilling tools.