Eni Cranks Up Ochigufu Deepwater Project Offshore Angola

Eni has marked its first project startup of the year with the deepwater Ochigufu oil project coming online offshore Angola.

Located in Block 15/06 in a water depth of 1,300 m (4,265 ft), wells in the field are connected to the Sangos production system and tied to the N’Goma FPSO. Production at Ochigufu, part of the West Hub development project, is expected to reach 25,000 bbl/d.

Eni, the operator with a 36.84% stake, said the company has discovered more than 3 Bbbl of oil in place and 850 MMbbl of reserves offshore Angola.

“These discoveries were then developed quickly and efficiently, with the sequential startup of the Sangos Field in 2014, Cinguvu in 2015, Mpungi and Mpungi North in 2016, East Hub in 2017 and now Ochigufu,” Eni said in a statement.

The operator is working toward the start of production from the UM8 reservoir and the Mpungi Field’s subsea boosting system, expected later this year in the East Hub. If all goes as planned, this will be followed in early 2019 with the start of production at the West Hub’s Vandumbu Field. Ochigufu was discovered by Eni in 2014 when the Ochigufu 1 NFW well hit 47 m (154 ft) of net oil pay in the Low Miocene and Oligocene sandstones.

Eni is the operator of Ochigufu with partners Sonangol (36.84%) and SSI Fifteen Ltd. (26.32%).

Statoil Moves Forward With Askeladd Development

Statoil and partners are moving forward with the Askeladd development, opting to invest more than $647.3 million.

The project is part of the Snøhvit project in the Barents Sea that will provide feedstock for the Hammerfest LNG plant.

Askeladd is expected to pave the way toward 21 Bcm (742 Bcf) of gas and 2 MMcm (71 MMcf) of condensate for the LNG plant, according to Statoil. The field is located about 40 km (25 miles) away from the Snøhvit Field in about 250 m (820 ft) of water.

Plans call for the development of three wells via two subsea templates. Each template has four well slots. New infrastructure will be added to tie-in Askeladd to the existing Snøhvit infrastructure, Statoil said in a news release.

“Askeladd will help maintain a plateau production rate at the Hammerfest LNG plant until 2023 and is a profitable investment that will help secure jobs and ripple effects in the region,” Torger Rød, Statoil’s senior vice president for project development, said in the release.

Earlier this year, Statoil said it had awarded engineering, procurement and construction contracts for delivery of subsea production systems and services to Aker Solutions. The company said it plans to award more contracts in the upcoming months.

Askeladd is expected to go onstream after 2020, Statoil said.

Partners are operator Statoil (36.79%), Petoro (30%), Total (18.40%), Neptune Energy Norge (12%) and DEA Norge (2.81%).

BP Awards McDermott, BHGE Subsea Contracts For West African Project

McDermott International Inc. and Baker Hughes, a GE company (BHGE), will provide FEED studies in advance of a substantial engineering, procurement, construction and installation (EPCI) contract for BP’s Tortue/Ahmeyim field development, the companies said.

The gas project is located on the maritime border of Mauritania and Senegal.

During this initial engineering phase, McDermott will work on defining the subsea umbilicals, risers and flowlines scope for the project, while BHGE will focus on the subsea production system scope.

The FEED is scheduled to begin and be completed this year. The agreement contains a mechanism to allow transition of the contract to a lump sum EPCI contract at a later date. McDermott will work jointly with BHGE to provide an optimized, integrated solution.

McDermott expects to use the project life-cycle management module from its new digital platform Gemini XD to deliver advanced technology through project execution and the development of a digital twin of the complete system.

The project also will benefit from BHGE’s RealTrack digital collaboration tool, which provides live, real-time reporting of schedule progress, document status and issues management for more efficient project execution.

Teams from McDermott and BHGE will perform the project management and FEED work from McDermott’s Epsom facility in the U.K.

ADNOC Awards Total Stakes In Two Offshore Concessions

On March 18 Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. (ADNOC) said it signed 40-year agreements with Total, awarding the company a 20% stake in the Umm Shaif and Nasr concession and a 5% interest in the Lower Zakum concession.

Total has contributed a participation fee of $1.15 billion for the Umm Shaif and Nasr concession and a fee of $300 million for the Lower Zakum concession, ADNOC said in a statement.

The agreements were signed by Sultan al Jaber, group chief executive of ADNOC, and Patrick Pouyanne, chairman and CEO of Total. The agreements are backdated to March 9, ADNOC said.

BP Selects Kongsberg For Mad Dog Phase 2 Dynamic Simulator

Kongsberg Digital has landed a contract to design, engineer, build, install and perform acceptance testing of a digital twin for the BP-operated Mad Dog Phase 2 project in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, according to a news release.

The model will cover all of the project’s oil and gas and subsea systems. This includes producing wells for water and gas injection, gas dehydration and regeneration, flare systems including systems for flare gas recovery, fuel gas, produced water and seawater, heating and cooling medium, and identified critical chemical injection systems, Kongsberg said in a news release.

Plans are for the digital twin models to be connected to the Mad Dog 2 facility-integrated control and safety systems “to create a realistic simulation environment that will deliver vital decision support for optimizing production efficiency,” Kongsberg said. “Applications of the simulator will include engineering studies, validation of process design, procedure validation, control system verification and operator training.”

The company will use its dynamic process modeling software, K-Spice, and transient multiphase flow software, LedaFlow, for the project.

The simulator is scheduled for delivery at least one year before first oil, according to the release.

Woodside Petroleum To Get Control Of Scarborough Gas Field

Oil and gas producer Woodside Petroleum said BHP Billiton has agreed to the sale of ExxonMobil Corp.’s 50% interest in Scarborough, making it the operator of the remote, deepwater gas field off the Western Australian coast.

In February Woodside agreed to pay $744 million for ExxonMobil's 50% stake in the project that has been stuck on the drawing board for nearly 40 years.

Subsea 7 Wins Contract For Work Offshore Azerbaijan

BP Exploration has selected Subsea 7 to provide subsea inspection, repair and maintenance services for the company’s Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli and Shah Deniz fields offshore Azerbaijan, according to a news release.

While the value of the five-year contract was not given, Subsea 7 called the award a substantial contract, meaning it has a value between $150 million and $300 million.

The work scope comprises the provision of a Life of Field support vessel, along with ROVs, supported by a Baku, Azerbaijan-based onshore project management and engineering team with assistance from Subsea 7’s i-Tech Services operations center, the release stated. Services were scheduled to start in March.

Wood Lands Three Contracts For Projects Offshore Senegal

Woodside has tapped Wood to carry out subsea and flow assurance studies relating to the proposed SNE Field development offshore Senegal.

The contracts cover three concept definition studies:

  • A targeted flow assurance study to ensure robust and safe design;
  • An engineering assessment to demonstrate the feasibility of a riser and umbilical system at potential FPSO facilities; and
  • A subsea flowlines study, according to a Wood news release.

The deepwater SNE Field is located in the Rufisque, Sangomar and Sangomar Deep Offshore blocks.

Statoil Becomes Operator Of Martin Linge Field, Garantiana Discovery

Statoil and Total have completed a transaction that sees Statoil acquire Total’s equity stakes in and take operatorships of the Martin Linge Field and the Garantiana discovery on the Norwegian Continental Shelf.

Statoil now has a 70% interest in Martin Linge and 40% in Garantiana. More than 120 employees from Total have been transferred to Statoil in accordance with the sale and purchase agreement and applicable legislation.

—Staff & Reuters Reports