deepwater

BHP Billiton lost billions during its foray into US shale, but that doesn’t mean it has soured on oil and gas—particularly when it comes to deepwater development.

BP has seen enormous payoff from a program to intervene in underperforming subsea wells in the Gulf of Mexico.

If approved by the US Department of Transportation, the port facility would allow VLCCs and other tankers to directly load cargo, potentially removing a major hurdle for US crude oil exports.

Sanctioned in 2014, the project is the largest deepwater offshore development in Angola. It will produce an estimated 230,000 BOPD from six different fields at peak.

The oil and gas industry has vastly accelerated the pace of approving investments for new projects over the past 18 months. New facilities worth more than $110 billion have been approved for development since the beginning of 2017 vs. only $50 billion in 2016.

ExxonMobil’s hot streak of offshore discoveries have sparked investor interest in the Guyana-Suriname basin. How did the company get there, and why do industry representatives feel optimistic about future deepwater prospects in the region?

As the resources that the industry develops become increasingly challenging, access to a broader range of options and new and developing approaches allows more-efficient and -effective recovery.

Integrated surveillance is critical for understanding reservoir dynamics and improving field management. A key component of the surveillance is areal monitoring of subsurface changes by use of time-lapse geophysical surveys such as 4D seismic.

The complete paper presents a numerical work flow to simulate the effect of flow-induced fines migration on production decline over time in deepwater reservoirs.

The two supermajors and offshore powerhouses are assessing the latest Gulf of Mexico discovery.