Exxon Angola Kizomba Project Starts Production

BP confirmed today the start of oil production from the Exxon Mobil-operated Kizomba Satellites phase 2 development in Block 15, offshore Angola.

The deepwater project is expected to produce around 70,000 barrels of oil per day at peak, and is expected to increase total daily Block 15 production to 350,000 barrels.

MILESTONE ALERT: World’s Longest Well Completed at Chayvo Field

Rosneft, as part of Sakhalin-1 Consortium, has completed drilling of the “world’s longest well” at the Chayvo field, off the coast of Sakhalin Island.

O-14 production well was drilled with Orlan drilling platform in direction of the field’s south-eastern point. According to Rosneft, the well has the world-record measured depth of 13,500 meters and a horizontal reach of 12,033 meters.

Top 5 FPSO Systems in Operation within Nigeria

Written by Oby Amaliri and Ikechukwu Onyegiri; Edited by Ikechukwu Onyegiri

Subsea field layout schematic: FPSO system

FPSO (Floating, Production, Storage and Offloading) system is a converted or custom-built ship-shaped floater, used to process oil and gas and for temporary storage of the oil prior to transshipment. The FPSO is a floating vessel used by the offshore industry for the processing of hydrocarbons as well as the storage of oil. A FPSO vessel is designed to receive hydrocarbons produced from nearby platforms or subsea template, process them, and store oil until it can be offloaded onto a tanker or transported through a pipeline

It is one of the best devised systems to have developed in the oil exploration industry for the marine areas. They will sometimes have production facilities onboard, and are normally used in areas where a pipeline to transport oil to shore isn’t available. Typically a shuttle tanker will moor alongside the FPSO and offload the stored oil periodically.

Innovative technologies, coupled with developments of existing ones, have played a big part in maintaining this standing for so long. The system is foolproof, enables cost efficiency and thus becomes a very major asset when it comes to excavating for oil in the marine areas and provides vast benefits in the production of marginal fields.

Benefits

Technology advancements since the inception of FPSOs have seen the arrival of a host of features, from geostationary turrets to allow the vessel to turn and ride prevailing weather, to the wider inclusion of water or gas injection and gas-lifts.

Also, its simplicity as an offshore production facility, capable of accumulating and storing oil before periodically offloading it to tankers for transport to the mainland – gives it an obvious logistic and economic appeal. Not only does this directly permit the rationalization of shuttle tanker movements but, more fundamentally, it can also allow marginal oil fields, or those in deepwater areas at some physical distance from existing pipelines, to be developed.

The system enables cost efficiency and thus becomes a very major asset when it comes to excavating for oil in the marine areas: it does not require the laying of pipelines and can be moved to new locations.

Finally, FPSOs eliminate the need for costly and expensive underwater infrastructure, they are more environmentally friendly than rigs, and their abandonment costs are less than for fixed platforms.


Top 5 FPSO Systems operating within Nigeria

In Nigeria today, we have about sixteen FPSO systems operating in different fields. Some of these FPSO sytems are used to operate in the top five deep water fields. These five are selected as the deepest base on their recoverable reserves and storage capacity.