Recoverable Oil News

The U.S.

The Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board (C-NLOPB) has approved the Development Plan Amendment (DPA) for the Hebron Field.The Hebron oil field is located offshore Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, in the Jeanne d'Arc Basin 340 kilometers southeast of St. John's. The field was first discovered in 1980, and is estimated to produce more than 700 million barrels of recoverable resources. The water depth at the Hebron field is 93 meters.The approval enables ExxonMobil and…

Hess Corp on Thursday said drilling results expected this month could add a seventh platform in Guyana, which would lift the nascent oil producing nation's output above the 1.2 million barrels of oil equivalent per day planned.The U.S. oil producer is part of the Exxon Mobil Corp-led consortium that controls all production in the tiny South American nation. The group has confirmed so far plans for six floating production vessels in the country, home to the world's largest offshore…

Dutch FPSO leasing specialist SBM Offshore said Thursday it had completed the US$1.75 billion project financing for the FPSO One Guyana. The company has previously said that this would be the company's largest FPSO so far. It will be deployed at ExxonMobil's Yellowtail development, offshore Guyana.The Dutch firm, which is behind all four FPSO projects in Guyana, said the One Guyana project financing was secured by a consortium of 15 international banks. SBM Offshore expects to draw the loan in full, phased over the construction period of the FPSO.

Brazilian state-controlled oil company Petrobras has bought its first cargo of Guyanese crude for refining domestically, the company told Reuters, as South America's newest producer expands its market reach.With the start of a second floating production facility in February, Guyana now sells two light and sweet oil grades with plans to pump up to 360,000 barrels per day (bpd) this year. The sales are helping the tiny nation rapidly boost its revenue."Petrobras constantly monitors the international oil market looking for different suppliers and new production worldwide," a company spokesperson said in a statement.The 1-million-barrel cargo of crude loaded last week from the Liza Destiny and departed on Monday onboard the Bahamas-flagged tanker Cascade Spirit.

Norway's Equinor has confirmed to Offshore Engineer that it has signed an agreement with FPSO owner Altera Infrastructure that could see the Petrojarl Knarr FPSO redeployed at the long-stalled Rosebank project in the UK North Sea. The FPSO is currently producing oil from Shell's Knarr field, offshore Norway, where it has been since early 2015. In April 2020 Shell extended the Knarr contract to March 2022.The Rosebank field, apparently Petrojarl Knarr FPSO's next location, is located 130 km northwest of the Shetland Islands in 1115 m water depth…

Exxon Mobil is in discussions with Dutch contractor SBM Offshore NV to build a fourth multibillion-dollar production unit to develop its Guyana oil discoveries, two people close to the negotiations said.The talks include the potential for some future platform assembly in Guyana, the people said. Guyana hopes to develop an oil industry infrastructure to boost the economy and job growth. Officials are under pressure to show the potential oil bonanza will be shared with its citizens.The South American country is home to the world's biggest offshore discoveries in years…

The U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) will hold an oil and gas lease sale for the Gulf of Mexico on November 17, complying with a U.S. District Court order.To remind, the Biden administration had paused all oil and gas leasing activities on federal lands and waters in January, citing climate crisis. A federal judge in Louisiana in June then ordered the resumption of oil and gas leasing on public lands and waters.Announcing the upcoming Gulf of Mexico lease sale on Thursday…

A landmark lawsuit filed against Guyana's government, arguing that oil production fuels climate change, could bolster legal action as court cases involving energy companies and state authorities surge, according to lawyers and environmentalists.The constitutional claim - the first of its kind in the English-speaking Caribbean - asserts that oil exploration and production led by U.S. oil major ExxonMobil off the South American country's coast is unconstitutional, said the case's lead lawyer Melinda Janki.Filed by two Guyanese citizens in late May before the tiny nation's constitutional court, the lawsuit centers on the duty of the state to protect the environment for present and future generations…

Global oil firms are preparing to spend more than $53 billion in Guyana’s coveted Stabroek Block during the coming decade.According to Rystad Energy research, recent discoveries in the Guyana-Suriname basin have proven a wider petroleum system and may cause an upgrade in resource estimates, drawing extra attention to upcoming wells.It said that with more than 8 billion barrels of recoverable oil discovered in Stabroek thus far, companies are set to boost their capital expenditure for the area, with ExxonMobil leading the way.The Liza field – the first and largest discovery in the block – has increased the oil major’s appetite, as its…

Operations to recover oil from a World War II-era shipwreck are nearing completion after commencing on May 11, 2019 off the coast of Long Island, N.Y., the U.S. Coast Guard said on Thursday.The sunken vessel, Coimbra, was a supply ship owned by Great Britain that was torpedoed by a German U-boat off the coast of Long Island during World War II. Initial dive operations in May 2019 confirmed the tanker was leaking small amounts of oil, the Coast Guard discovered.A unified command…

The United States has a world-leading 293 billion barrels of recoverable oil resources, which is 20Bbbl more than Saudi Arabia and 100Bbbl more than Russia, with the Permian Basin leading that charge.Rystad Energy’s estimate of US recoverable oil is also five times more than officially reported proven reserves as published in the BP Statistical Review of World Energy 2019.Tight oil plays in the Permian Basin in Texas and New Mexico now hold 100 billion barrels of recoverable oil resources, according to Rystad Energy’s analysis. Shale/tight resources in the Permian thus remain largely flat from the previous year, as production has been replaced through improvements in well configuration…

The Norwegian Petroleum Directorate (NPD) has granted consent to Equinor for the extension of production on Norne FPSO with associated facilities for the Norne, Urd and Skuld fields in the Norwegian Sea.Lifetime extension granted for FPSO is for four years to March 2026, as the operator eyes additional 132m barrels from Norwegian Sea field.In its application for extension, operator Equinor has described an improved drainage strategy for the Norne field and the nearby Urd and Skuld fields.The Norne, Urd, Skuld, Alve and Marulk fields are tied in to the Norne ship. The authorities approved an amended Plan for Development and Operation…

A U.S. Navy led team has removed 229,000 gallons of oil from a sunken World War II era German heavy cruiser that has been resting on the seafloor near the Marshall Islands for more than 70 years.After being transferred to the U.S. as a war prize, the cruiser Prinz Eugen was loaded with oil and cargo and used to assess survivability of warships during the Operation Crossroads atomic bomb tests in the Pacific. The ship survived two atomic blasts before being towed to Kwajalein Atoll…

Equinor and partners Lundin and Spirit Energy have struck oil in the PL 167 licence at the Utsira High in the North Sea.The discovery is currently estimated to contain 15-35 million barrels of recoverable oil equivalent.“We are very pleased to announce the first Equinor discovery,” said Nicholas Ashton, Equinor’s senior vice president, Exploration, Norway & UK.“This is a good discovery which we expect will be commercial. In addition, the results from the drilling indicate an upside potential in this discovery…

As Shell finishes construction on its Appomattox Semi-Submersible Platform hull, Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement engineers and inspectors signed off on several topsides components during a pre-production inspection March 27, 2018. Royal Dutch Shell plc, 79 percent owner and its partner, Nexen Petroleum Offshore U.S. A. Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of CNOOC ltd, will operate the platform about 80 miles off Louisiana’s coast in the Mississippi Canyon. “The Appomattox will be Shell’s largest floating platform in the Gulf of Mexico…

Exxon Mobil Corporation announced its sixth oil discovery offshore Guyana since 2015, following positive results from its Ranger-1 exploration well. The Ranger-1 well discovery adds to previous discoveries at Liza, Payara, Snoek, Liza Deep and Turbot, which are estimated to total more than 3.2 billion recoverable oil-equivalent barrels. ExxonMobil affiliate Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Ltd. began drilling the Ranger-1 well on November 5, 2017 and encountered approximately 70 meters of high-quality, oil-bearing carbonate reservoir.

Teekay informs that the FPSO Pioneiro de Libra arrived May 17 in Brazilian territorial waters. The FPSO unit, owned through a 50/50 joint venture between Odebrecht Oil & Gas and Teekay Offshore, will be the first to produce oil in the Libra Block which covers more than 1,500 square kilometers in the Santos Basin and has estimated reserves of 8-12 billion barrels of recoverable oil. The first oil is scheduled for July. The unit can operate at water depths of up to 2,400 meters…

Even the so-called shale revolution in the United States did not stop striving for sustainable business with the direct support of the state to extract "Arctic" oil Don wrote on his page to Facebook. In the Arctic sector of the US (Alaska) are two sedimentary basins - the North Slope of Alaska and the Beaufort. In these basins exploration conducted most intensively since the late 1970s until 1996, he reminded the politician. Much of this work has been concentrated in the eastern part of the basin of the North Slope of Alaska, where in 1968 opened a giant oil field Prudhoe Bay, which is being developed since 1977. Since the beginning of work on the Arctic shelf of the United States was drilled 131 exploration well…

The U.S. Interior Department on Wednesday granted Royal Dutch Shell two final permits to explore for crude in the Arctic this summer, but said the company cannot drill into the oil zone until required emergency equipment arrives in the region. The department's Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) conditionally granted Shell permits for exploration in the Chukchi Sea off Alaska, in a season which sea ice limits from July until October. But Shell must have emergency equipment to contain a potential blown-out well deployable within 24 hours before drilling into the oil zone…

William Cho, Head of MatthewsDaniel Weather, a division of the Bureau Veritas Group, explains why improvements in drilling technologies and weather monitoring systems have made offshore shelf drilling operations in the Arctic Circle increasingly attractive to upstream oil and gas companies and their investors. Rising crude oil prices motivate not only technological innovators to explore cheaper alternative energy sources, such as solar panels and wind turbines, but also upstream oil and gas companies to explore new oil reserves which had not otherwise been economical.

Statoil, on behalf of the license holders, has submitted a Plan for Development and Operation of the Trestakk discovery on the Halten Bank to the minister for petroleum and energy, Tord Lien, in Bodø. Capital expenditures are estimated at approximately 5.5 billion NOK. The discovery, made in 1986, contains about 76 million barrels of recoverable oil equivalent, mainly oil. The project will be tied back to the Åsgard A oil production vessel, with planned production startup anticipated in 2019. “Trestakk is a good example of what is possible to achieve through spending time on working toward the best concept selection. By rethinking our concept along with license partners and suppliers, we have arrived at a solution that costs almost 50 percent less than the original concept.

The Obama administration on Friday blocked new exploration for oil and gas in Arctic waters, in a win for environmental groups that had fought development of the ecologically fragile region. The Department of the Interior released a 2017 to 2022 leasing plan that blocked drilling in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas off northern Alaska. It also limited petroleum development in the Cook Inlet off south-central Alaska. Environmental activists have battled drilling in Alaska to protect whales, walruses and seals, and as part of a broader movement to keep remaining fossil fuels in the ground.