By Ijeoma Agudosi-Lagos
Chevron’s subsidiary, Star Deep Water Petroleum, has awarded FMC Technologies, a US$268 million contract to provide subsea equipment for operations for the Agbami field’s Phase 3, offshore Nigeria.
The Agbami field is located 113km off the coast of the central Niger Delta region, at a water depth of about 4800ft.
Agbami, Nigeria’s largest deepwater development, is FMC’s first major subsea project in Nigeria which comprises twelve four-slot manifolds and suction piles. Phase 3 of the project includes a five-well drilling program.
Front-end engineering and design work began in early 2014 and drilling is scheduled to continue through 2017.
FMC is supplying subsea infrastructure including trees, manifolds, suction piles, subsea distribution, topside controls, flying leads and flexible jumper connection systems with swivels; system integration, testing, installation assistance, service and maintenance; and development of Titus wellhead connectors for interchangeable use on alternate wellhead profiles.
FMC Technologies noted that subsea equipment will provide additional production and help extend the life of the Agbami deepwater development.
At Agbami, loading is accomplished using a single buoy mooring (SBM) located approximately 2km from the Agbami Floating Production, Storage and Offloading (FPSO) vessel.
The Agbami FPSO is one of the largest facilities of this type ever constructed and has an overall storage capacity of 2.15MMbbl. According to Chevron, production at Agbami began in 2008 and quickly ramped up to 230,000b/d. A 10-well
Phase 2 development program is expected to offset field decline and to maintain production capacity. Drilling, which began in 2012, is expected to continue through 2015. As of early 2014, four of the wells are producing.
Chevron operates the Agbami field through its subsidiary Star Deep Water Petroleum with a 45 percent interest. Partners include Statoil (35%), NNPC (15%) and Petrobras (5%).
This month, Chevron announced its new $39.8 billion capital and exploratory investment program for 2014. Upstream spending in 2014 for major capital projects also includes two Nigerian deepwater fields: Usan and Agbami.