E&P Highlights: Aug. 15, 2022

From a discovery to sanctions, below is a compilation of the latest headlines in the E&P space within the past week. 

Activity headlines

Aker BP submits Trell & Trine PDO, awards contracts

Aker BP submitted a plan for development and operation (PDO) to Norway’s Ministry of Petroleum and Energy that would tie back the Trell and Trine fields to the Alvheim FPSO. Aker BP has also awarded contracts for the Trell and Trine subsea tieback in the North Sea in about 120 m water depth.

The discoveries at Trell in PL 102 F/G and Trine in PL 036E/F are about 24 km east of the Alvheim FPSO.

Aker BP plans to develop Trell and Trine with three wells and two new subsea manifolds to be tied back to existing infrastructure on East Kameleon and further on to the Alvheim FPSO. One of the three wells is Trell Nord, which although not yet proven, has a high likelihood of discovery, Aker BP said. When the Trell production well is drilled, the plan is to first prove hydrocarbons in Trell Nord, then drill the wells in Trell and Trine, the operator said.

The program will conclude with the production well in Trell Nord. Recoverable resources in Trell and Trine are estimated at 25 MMboe.

Total investments are estimated at about $700 million with production scheduled to start in the first quarter of 2025.  

Aker BP awarded Subsea 7 a contract that includes engineering, procurement, construction and installation of the pipelines, spools, protection covers and tie-ins using vessels from Subsea 7’s fleet. The production pipeline is a pipe-in-pipe design. Project management and engineering will be through Subsea 7’s offices in Stavanger, Norway, while fabrication of the pipelines will take place at Subsea 7’s spoolbase at Vigra, Norway. Offshore operations are expected to take place in 2023 and 2024.

Aker Solutions will provide the subsea production system for the Trell and Trine field development. Aker Solutions will deliver a subsea production system including three horizontal subsea trees, two manifolds, control systems, close to 30 km of subsea umbilicals, as well as associated equipment and installation work. The work will start immediately with final deliveries scheduled for the first quarter of 2024.

"From an operational perspective, the Alvheim area is one of the most cost-effective on the Norwegian shelf, and the resource base has expanded dramatically since the field came onstream. This is the result of targeted exploration and business development, technological innovation and, not least, the level of cooperation with the suppliers," Aker BP CEO Karl Johnny Hersvik said in a press release. 

The Alvheim field consists of the Kneler, Boa, Kameleon and East Kameleon structures, subsequently joined by the Viper-Kobra structures and the Gekko discovery. The Alvheim area includes satellite fields Bøyla, Vilje, Volund and Skogul. All of these fields are produced via the Alvheim FPSO, which came onstream in June 2008. 

When the Alvheim development was approved, the recoverable resources were estimated at less than 200 MMbblmillion barrels. Since then, close to 550 MMbbl have been produced from the Alvheim area. 

Thomas Hoff-Hansen, vice president, operations & asset development of the Alvheim Asset, says the ambition is to develop and produce a billion barrels by 2040. 

“When Trell and Trine are approved, the Alvheim area will surpass 750 million barrels either produced or sanctioned for development,” Hoff-Hansen said in a press release.

Aker BP operates the Trell & Trine fields on behalf of partners Petoro and LOTOS Exploration & Production Norge.

Talon approves FID for Walyering in Perth Basin

Strike Energy announced it has sanctioned the A$14.4 million Walyering Gas Project onshore western Australia. 

Development costs include a 33 TJ/d and 1400 bbl storage facility and well completion.

Final investment decision (FID) followed completion of RISC Advisory’s independent certification of 2P gas reserves in the field at 54.2 PJ. Strike and partner Talon Energy have been working toward FID since discovery with the Walyering-5 appraisal well in December 2021 and a secondary gas discovery with Walyering-6 appraisal well in May 2022. In April 2022, Strike awarded Momentum Engineering the front end engineering design (FEED) for the upstream gas processing facilities and related infrastructure, with the upstream design limit being the entry into the Parmelia Gas Pipeline. FEED has been completed and detailed design is nearing completion.

The development will consist of the completion of the Walyering 5 and 6 wells, with production processed on-site through a facility designed to process 33 TJ/d of gas and separate between 150 bbl/d–300 bbl/d of condensate, which will be diverted to onsite storage, making it available for delivery to point of sale via truck transport from the Brand Highway. Gas production will initially be tied into the Parmelia Gas Pipeline 1 km away, with an ongoing review into the feasibility of connecting into the Dampier to Bunbury Natural Gas Pipeline at a later date. 

Capex costs include completion for Walyering wells 5 and 6, the construction and commissioning of the onsite processing facility, and related infrastructure. Strike will control and monitor field operations from its new operations center in West Perth.

The project in EP447 in the Perth Basin is expected to have finalized gas offtake contracts at the end of 2022 and first gas sales in the first quarter of 2023. 

Strike operates the project with 55% interest on behalf of partner Talon with 45% interest.

Maholo pilot producing 1.25 mmcf/d

Comet Ridge reported that its Mahalo North 1 pilot well continues to flow at over 1.25 MMcf/d.

Located in the Bowen Basin in Central Queensland, Australia, the pilot well flow rate has improved by 65% in three weeks, the company said. At the same time, the bottomhole pressure remains above the target drawdown level, although it is gradually declining daily. Comet Ridge reports that produced water is steady at 1,180 bbl/d of water.

“The large volume of water we have produced from this pilot suggests it is accessing a very large volume of gas,” Comet Ridge Managing Director Tor McCaul said in a press release. “The Mahalo North Project is fast becoming an important part of the Mahalo Gas Hub area.”

Comet Ridge holds 100% equity in the 450-sq-km block.

Aker BP finds more oil near Skarv

Deepsea Nordkapp Odfjell: The Deepsea Nordkapp drilled well 6507/3-15. Source: Odfjell Drilling.

Map showing the location of well 6507/3-15. Source: NPD

The Norwegian Petroleum Directorate announced that Aker BP ASA found oil and gas with its wildcat well 6507/3-15 in the Norwegian Sea near the Skarv field.

Preliminary estimates place the size of the discovery between 1.7 MMcm and 5.7 MMcm of recoverable oil equivalent. 

Aker BP and its partners will consider producing the discovery via the Skarv field 14 km away.

The Deepsea Nordkapp drilled the well, primarily targeting petroleum in reservoir rocks from the Middle Jurassic (the Fangst Group) and secondarily targeting petroleum in reservoir rocks from the Lower Jurassic (the Båt Group).

Drilled in 348 m of water, the well encountered an oil and gas column totaling about 115 m in the Fangst and Båt groups, 40 m of which was in sandstone layers with good reservoir quality in the primary exploration target in the Fangst Group, and about 55 m in sandstone layers with moderate to good reservoir quality in the secondary exploration target in the Båt Group.

There was an additional 100 m of sandstone layers in the Båt Group with moderate to good reservoir quality. 

The well was drilled to a vertical depth of 2,197 m below sea level and was terminated in the Åre Formation in the Lower Jurassic. 

The well was not formation-tested, but the company acquired extensive data acquisition and sampling were carried out. The well will now be permanently plugged and abandoned.

This is the first well in PL 941, which was awarded in 2017. The Deepsea Nordkapp will move to drill wildcat well 6507/3-16 in the same production license in the Norwegian Sea for Aker BP.

Contracts and company news

Saipem wins Quiluma, Maboqueiro contracts

Saipem won one onshore and two offshore contracts from the New Gas Consortium for the  Quiluma and Maboqueiro project off northwest Angola.

Valued at $900 million, the contracts include engineering, procurement and construction, including hook-up and commissioning assistance of the Quiluma platform and the relevant onshore natural gas processing plant. 

The New Gas Consortium is composed of two wholly owned subsidiaries of Azule Energy (Eni Angola Exploration B.V. and BP Exploration Angola Limited) along with Sonangol P&P, Chevron and TotalEnergies.

Shelf provides fleet update

Shelf Drilling reported that it completed the purchase of the Deep Driller 7 and renamed it the Shelf Drilling Victory. It has begun reactivation project in UAE. 

The company also reported securing contracts for other rigs in its August fleet status report. Saudi Aramco awarded the Shelf Drilling Achiever a three-year contract extension.

ONGC India awarded a three-year contract to F.G. McClintock, expected to begin in January 2023, following completion of its current contract with the same customer in October 2022 and planned contract preparation project. ONGC India also awarded the C.E. Thornton a three-year contract, expected to begin in April 2023 following completion of its current contract with the same customer in December 2022 and planned contract preparation project. 

Masirah Oil in Oman awarded Compact Driller a contract for two firm wells plus two optional wells, expected to begin in October 2022 following the completion of its current contract with Cairn in India. 

Key Singapore started its contract with Cairn in India in June 2022. Shelf Drilling Enterprise started its three-year contract with PTTEP in Thailand in July 2022. Shelf Drilling Scepter completed its short-term contract with Cuu Long JOC in Vietnam in August and has been demobilized to Singapore. Shelf Drilling Mentor started its contract with an undisclosed operator in Nigeria in July 2022. 

Subsea 7 awards wave monitoring contracts

Miros Group won contracts to install its internet of things (IoT) dry-sensor WaveSystem on three Subsea 7 pipelay support vessels.

Under the trio of three-year agreements, Miros’ WaveSystem will enable the Seven Waves, Seven Rio and Seven Sun vessels to monitor wave and current to a water depth of 10 m while Miros Cloud services delivers real-time sea state data. 

Each contract, which will begin between first and third quarters of this year, comprises a three-year period plus a subsequent one-year option.

Strohm tapped for TCP flowlines for Woodside

Strohm announced it will manufacture and deliver two Thermoplastic Composite Pipe (TCP) flowlines to Woodside Energy Ltd. to serve as part of the relief well emergency response plans for the well construction phase of the Scarborough field development. This marks the first time TCP has been chosen for the application, Strohm said.

The emergency response system, with two 600-m TCP flowlines, will be stored onshore for timely deployment to the field in the event of a drilling-related source control incident. Two floating drill rigs would pump high-density kill fluid, using well kill manifolds on the seabed. The TCP flowlines would be laid on the seabed to connect the manifolds, facilitating the co-mingling of kill fluid to a relief well.

Strohm will deliver the TCP flowlines spooled onto storage and installation baskets that can be lowered to the seabed from a local vessel of opportunity.

The Scarborough field in the Exmouth sub-basin off the coast of Western Australia will include 13 subsea wells tied back to a floating platform moored in 900 m water depth. Gas from the field will be processed at the expanded Pluto liquefied natural gas export facility near Karratha. 

In its entirety, Woodside’s Scarborough development represents an investment of US$12 billion (A$16.2 billion).

ProFrac picks Flotek analyzers

Flotek Chairman and CEO John W. Gibson, Jr. said the company started a 10-year chemistry supply agreement with ProFrac. 

“ProFrac's adoption of Flotek's JP3 Verax analyzers is expected to accelerate diesel's replacement with natural gas produced in the field in ProFrac's dual-fuel fleets, thereby simultaneously reducing cost and greenhouse gas emissions while increasing returns to our producer customers and protecting their capital equipment,” Gibson said. "Current use cases show that maximizing natural gas usage in dual fuel fleets can reduce diesel consumption by 50%-70%.” 

Gibson said this can enable dual fuel operations to adhere to Tier 4 EPA emissions requirements, and can represent a reduction of 35% compared to Tier 2.