India’s three upstream companies have lined up separate plans to develop marginal/small discovered fields in three contract areas offshore in the Mumbai Basin in a cluster method by sharing existing subsea infrastructure of neighbors.

The contract areas, awarded in 2017 as part of a discovered small fields (DSF) bidding round, are B-9, B-37 and B-80.

Adani Welspun Exploration Ltd. (AWEL) is preparing to drill 12 development wells and install offshore production facilities in B-9 while Sun Petrochemicals Ltd. is looking to drill 16 wells with subsea structures in B-37.

A consortium-led by Hindustan Oil Exploration Co. Ltd. (HOEC) plans to drill and complete six wells and re-enter three existing wells in B-80.

“We have provided several incentives to the investors to make the development of discovered small fields economically viable, such as waiver of customs duty on goods and services imported for the projects and provision to use the existing infrastructure in the adjacent fields developed by NOCs [national oil companies],” a petroleum ministry official said.

The prospects in the three contract areas were discovered by the state-run upstream company ONGC Ltd. but remained undeveloped as they were deemed to be marginal and below the economic threshold for development.

All of the prospects are located near producing oil and gas fields operated by ONGC in the Mumbai Basin.

B-9

Adani Welspun proposes to develop three prospects in B-9 with 12 development wells in a cluster method. The prospects are B-9 (gas), B-7 (gas) and BRC (oil).

The development plan involves drilling seven wells in B-9, three in B-6 and two in BRC, and installing two wellhead platforms in B-9 and one each in the B-7 and BRC areas.

The plan includes laying a 10-km (6-mile) intra-field subsea pipeline (up to 8 in.) within the B-9 area; 80-km (50-mile) subsea pipeline (up to 10 in.) from the B-9 Field to a nearby operator’s existing wellhead platform.

“Platform jackets being considered as mono-towers or three-legged jackets or alternatives. Subsea completions of wells may also be explored as options if economically viable,” Adani Welspun said in a report.

The operator will use neighboring ONGC’s existing Mumbai High North offshore and processing facilities to produce oil and gas.

Peak production rate from B-9 and B-7 is expected to be about 32 million standard cubic feet per day (MMscf/d) and 21 MMscf/d, respectively, for a plateau period of four years. The two wells in BRC are expected to produce 80 bbl/d for a plateau period of two years.

Initial studies indicate that in-place oil and gas reserves for these three prospects are estimated at 4.5 Bcm (158.4 Bcf), 2 Bcm (69.5 Bcf) and 73 Mbbl, respectively.

AWEL holds 100% participating interest (PI) in this concession.

B-37

Sun Petrochemicals has a plan to develop four prospects in B-37 area with 16 wells. The prospects are B-37 (oil and gas), B-51 (gas), B-174 (gas) and B-183 (gas).

The plan includes drilling four development wells in each field, laying subsea pipelines, installing a production platform to process produced fluids and hot-tapping into ONGC’s existing Neelam Process Complex for evacuation of oil and gas.

Drilling will target the Mukta, Bassein and Bombay pay zones (Early Oligocene to Middle Oligocene). Four exploration wells (B-37-1, B-37-4, B-51-1 and B-174-1), drilled by ONGC in the late 1990s, established the presence of hydrocarbons in the two formations.

The in-place oil/gas reserves in B-37, B-51, B-174 and B-183 are estimated to be 7,990 Mbbl and2.2 Bcm (77.84 Bcf), 680 MMcm (24.028 Bcf), 1.5 Bcm (52.28 Bcf) and 69 MMcm (2.437 Bcf), respectively.

The four prospects are located 7 km (4 miles) to 20 km (12 miles) from the producing Neelam, Bassein and Vasai East fields operated by ONGC.

Sun Petrochemicals owns 100% PI in this concession.

B-80

HOEC is looking to develop the prospects in B-80 area. The company intends to drill six new development wells and re-enter and complete three existing wells (B-80-1, B-80-2 and B-80-4ST). Drilling will target hydrocarbons in the Panna pay zone (Palaeocene to Early Eocene) in B-80, which is estimated to have in-place reserves of 297 MMcm (10.496 Bcf) of gas and 13,267 Mbbl of oil.

The plan includes hiring a mobile offshore processing unit (MOPU) to process produced fluids and laying two separate subsea pipelines and hot-tapping into ONGC’s ICP-Heera line and the WO16-BPB line for evacuation of oil and gas.

“The MOPU will have the capacity to handle 10,000 bbl/d [of] liquid and 15 MMscfd [of] gas. Six subsea wells will be connected to MOPU,” HOEC said in a report. “Hot tapping jobs will be carried out to ONGC’s oil and gas pipelines respectively and trunk lines will be connected to MOPU. Processed oil and gas after measurement at MOPU will be transported using these pipelines to Heera and Bassein station.”

The prospects in B-80 are located about 20 km from the producing Bassein and Vasai East fields.

HOEC and Adbhoot Estates have equal PI of 50% in this block.