Petrobras is pushing ahead with its ultra-deepwater Carioca field development in the pre-salt Santos Basin after signing a Letter of Intent (LoI) for a leased FPSO, while also separately confirming its plans for a 100,000 b/d floater in the frontier Sergipe Basin.

The operator confirmed at the OTC Brasil event in Rio that it is chartering the Floating Production, Storage and Offloading vessel from Modec and Schahin Petróleo e Gás to produce Carioca in an initial development phase.
But it also revealed in a separate presentation at the event that its plans for the Sergipe Águas Profundas (Deepwater Sergipe) project are well underway, with a production system scheduled to come onstream in 2018.

Petrobras’ director for E&P, José Formigli, confirmed the planned onstream date for Deepwater Sergipe during one conference panel session, as well as the expected production capacity of 100,000 b/d of oil. “We are confident that other opportunities will be identified by the exploration professionals in the Equatorial Margin,” he added.

The operator had only just revealed (see separate story, page 4) that a well test on its Farfan-1 probe in BM-SEAL-11 in the Sergipe-Alagoas Basin had confirmed the extent of the discovery and excellent light oil productivity. Farfan lies 104 km offshore in 2,476 m (8,124 ft) of water. Petrobras operates the block with a 60% stake, with its partner IBV-BRASIL (40%).

DI was told at OTC Brasil that Farfan will be developed via a leased FPSO, similar to the one it has just ordered from Modec-Schahin for Carioca in BM-S-9 in the Santos Basin.

Petrobras operates Carioca in consortium with BG E&P Brasil and Repsol Sinopec, with the companies having recently made the Iguaçu Mirim oil find in the Carioca evaluation plan area with well 3-SPS-101 (3-BRSA-1179-SPS). That well is around 34 km south of the original discovery well (see DI, 12 August 2013, page 4).
No doubt bolstered by the additional reserves, Petrobras confirmed at the show that the company’s affiliate Guará BV had now signed on its behalf an LoI to charter the new FPSO with Japan’s Modec and its Brazilian partner Schahin Petróleo e Gás S.A.

The field will be connected to the FPSO initially via eight wells, four as producers and four as injectors, with the possibility of adding subsequent wells later. The Carioca area is expected to start producing in August 2016.

The floating production platform will have a processing capacity of up to 100,000 b/d of oil and 5 MMcm/d of natural gas. The FPSO will be operated by the companies responsible for its construction, Modec and Schahin, and chartered to the BM-S-9 consortium for a period of 20 years. The Carioca FPSO is scheduled to be delivered by June 2016, and onstream by September, located in a water depth of 2,140 m (7,021 ft).

The BM-S-9 consortium is a partnership between Petrobras (operator, 45%), BG (30%) and Repsol Sinopec (25%).
The FPSO award means a further contract for the subsea riser system is likely to follow in the near future, with the steel lazy-wave design to handle pressures of up to 10,000psi. The usual contenders are chasing this award, including Odebrecht Oil & Gas, Saipem and Technip, with the latter understood to be in pole position.

Originally the Carioca FPSO was due to be one of the eight replicant 150,000 b/d FPSOs under construction at Estaleiro Rio Grande shipyard, but later Petrobras decided to lease a smaller capacity FPSO instead after some concerns about the extent of the field’s reserves (currently put at around 300 MMboe). Petrobras plans to use some of the field’s gas to power the FPSO, while re-injecting the rest of the gas and carbon dioxide to boost oil productivity.

Other prospective FPSO projects in Brazil currently, aside from Sergipe and Carioca, are:
• Petrobras Tartaruga Verde e Mestica FPSO
• Petrobras Parque dos Doces FPSO
• Petrobras Sul de Parque des Baleias FPSO
• Petrobras Maromba FPSO
• Petrobras Carcara FPSO
• Petrobras Guanambi GTL FPSO.

Offshore