Engie Eyes New Gjoa Wildcats
Friday 10 March 2017
Engie E&P is lining up two more exploration wells near its producing Gjoa field off Norway after coming up trumps with the nearby Cara discovery as productivity rates exceed expectations.
The French operator has identified two prospects - P1/North and Hamlet - outside the Gjoa production area that it plans to drill in either 2018 or 2019, marking the first exploration at the field in the northern North Sea since start-up in 2010.
The field in Engie-operated production licence 153 had record output last year of 43.8 million barrels of oil equivalent, 5% up on 2015.
It is now expected to produce 60 million boe more than originally expected due to “good reservoir management”, according to Gjoa asset manager Hilde Aadland.
The higher reservoir productivity rate is mainly attributed to the fact wells have delivered more than anticipated, as well as that the Gjoa facility’s processing capacity, and process and export regularity have been higher than predicted.
Engie also plans to carry out a 4D seismic survey over the Gjoa area this summer to improve understanding of the field’s remaining resource potential and optimise future drilling and recovery plans.
The renewed exploration effort has been spurred by the Cara oil and gas find made last year in Engie-operated PL636, about six kilometres north-east of Gjoa, that turned up between 25 million and 70 million boe.
Engie’s head of sub-surface for Norway, Raphael Fillon, said the discovery “gives us a better understanding of the subsurface, and strengthens our expectations for other licences in this area”.
Cara is likely to extend the lifetime of the Gjoa field, which is producing from four subsea templates and a satellite well tied back to a semi-submersible production and processing facility.