FPSO BW Adolo arrives in Gabonese waters

August 22, 2018

BW Offshore’s FPSO BW Adolo has arrived offshore Gabon and is preparing for installation and production start-up at the Tortue field in the coming months.

The Tortue field is one of four proven discoveries in the Ruche area, within the Dussafu License, offshore Gabon.

It is operated by BW Energy Gabon (BWEG), which holds a 91.667 percent interest while Panoro holds an 8.333 percent interest as a partner. BW Energy is a subsidiary of BW Offshore.

Panoro said in its second-quarter financial report on Tuesday that the FPSO had reached Gabon and that the start-up of production at the Tortue field would happen in the coming months.

The Adolo FPSO had previously worked on the Azurite field but was later selected by BW for the Tortue development. The FPSO unit was prepared for deployment at Tortue by a Keppel shipyard in Singapore and officially named FPSO BW Adolo in early April. The FPSO began its journey from Singapore to Gabon back in July.

It is worth reminding that BW completed the drilling of the DTM-3H oil production well in June.

The well was drilled and completed as a horizontal production well in the Gamba reservoir and encountered a long horizontal section of oil-saturated Gamba sandstone as expected. The well was suspended after installation of the subsea tree and is currently ready for production. The DTM-3H drilling concluded the Phase 1 development well drilling program at the field.

Panoro added in the report that first oil from Phase 1 at Tortue was on schedule to be achieved in the second half of 2018 and the operator estimates that the initial gross production rates would be in the range of 10,000 to 15,000 barrels of oil per day.

According to the company, planning for Phase 2 at Tortue is underway and is likely to consist of further production wells in the Gamba and Dentale D6 reservoirs.

Ruche field drilling

The company said that the DRNEM-1 well at the Ruche North East location off Gabon was spud by the Borr Norve jack-up drilling rig following the end of the quarter. According to Panoro, results from the well are expected in September.

The Ruche North East target is an undrilled four-way structure at the Gamba reservoir with Dentale potential. The well is located about 3.5 km northeast of the Ruche field in water depths of 117m. The objective of the well is to delineate further resources in preparation for possible future second production hub in the Ruche area.

The drilling of DRNEM-1 comes following the completion of drilling operations at the second production well, DTM-3H, on the Tortue field.