Statoil Starts Production From Fram C East

Statoil has begun production from the Fram C East subsea satellite, lifting activities for the nearby Troll C platform in the Norwegian North Sea.

The company credited increased drilling efficiency and what it called a “simple, smart” concept to cutting about US $24 million off the project’s $97 million original price tag.

“Profitability is resilient with a low breakeven,” Statoil said.

The Fram C East development is a long production well drilled from the existing Fram subsea template. Production from the development, which has estimated recoverable resources of 18.2 million barrels of oil and 1.6 billion standard cubic meters of gas, will be tied back to the Troll C platform hub. From here, gas will be transported to Kollsnes via Troll A, while oil will be piped to Mongstad for further processing. “Fram C East is a small development project, but a key element of our plans to capture maximum value in the Fram area,” Lars Høier, vice president operations for Troll and Fram, said in a company statement. “We are pleased to see that our targeted efforts to cut costs and improve profitability on the Norwegian continental shelf (NCS) have benefitted this development project. Fram C East has seen profitability rise from good to even better, and will see a positive cash flow as early as in 2016.”

Tullow Flows Oil From TEN Offshore Ghana

Now that Tullow Oil and partners have delivered first oil from the Tweneboa, Enyenra, Ntomme (TEN) fields offshore Ghana to the FPSO Prof. John Evans Atta Mills, oil production is gradually increasing toward the FPSO capacity of 80,000 bbl/d.

The annual average production will be about 23,000 bbl/d gross (11,000 bbl/d net for Tullow), Tullow said in a news release Aug. 18. TEN marked first oil, which the operator said was accomplished on time and within budget, about three years after Ghanaian authorities approved the development plan.

“This is an important moment for Tullow as production begins from our second operated development in Ghana,” Tullow Oil CEO Aidan Heavey said.

At a water depth of between 1,000 m and 2,000 m, the project’s subsea components include 70-km flowlines, 60-km umbilicals and 40-km risers with two riser bases, 24 Christmas trees and four oil production manifolds and one gas export manifold. Most of the subsea production equipment, which weighed in at about 35,000 tonnes, was installed by the TS7 consortium of Technip and Subsea 7.

Plateau production is expected to be reached in 2017, the same year gas exports were set to begin.

But gas exports could start sooner than planned.

Tullow said it has been exploring options to accelerate gas export, considering fabrication of the gas export facilities could be finished in late 2016, about six months ahead of schedule.

The Ghana National Gas Corp. pipeline will transport the gas to the Atuabo gas processing plant in western Ghana, according to Tullow.

The Tweneboa gas field is due onstream in 2018.

Tullow holds a 47.175% stake in the fields. Partners are Anadarko Petroleum Corp., 17%; Kosmos Energy, 17%; Ghana National Petroleum Corp., 15%; and PetroSA, 3.875%.

—Velda Addison

Offshore