Its hard to say as there are a lot of variables, but yes 18...

Its hard to say as there are a lot of variables, but yes 18 months is a fair estimate of the extra time it would take to build a hull from scratch vs. repurposing an existing FPSO. Chinese and South Korean yards can crank these hulls out in suprising short timeframes but you pay a premium if you're in a hurry. The biggest advantage I can see is that the steel price is locked in; getting a fixed price for any large steel fab project is really hard right now as the steel suppliers will only fix a price for a few days. The other advantage is that there's a fair bit going on in the FPSO market, so we'd be in a queue. Locking in a vessel early will be a real bonus. None of this should be a surprise though, I don't expect a new build would have gotten a lot of consideration.