Premier Oil's Catcher North Sea floating production project is on schedule for startup later this year with a 29% reduced capital budget compared to when it was sanctioned, at US$1.6 billion.
The Catcher area is expected to produce 96 MMboe, with a peak production rate of around 50,000 b/d. The development was due comprise 22 subsea wells (14 producers and eight water injectors) on the Catcher, Varadero, and Burgman fields, tied back to a leased floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel, supplied by BW Offshore.
Eight development wells have now been completed on the field and all have come in at or better than prognosis in terms of reservoir quality and deliverability, says Premier Oil.
"Due to these strong well results and well placement optimization, the well count required to deliver the base plan has reduced to 20 wells, thus delivering further significant reductions to the forecast development cost," says Premier Oil.
Sail-away of the FPSO from Singapore is expected to be around mid-year. Only short subsea campaigns, commencing in June, will be required in 2017 to tie-in the new wells drilled and to support the hook up of the floating production vessel.
Tolmount project
Premier Oil is also eying development options for its southern North Sea Tolmount project. The development concept for the gas field is at an advanced stage, comprising a standalone normally unattended installation and a new gas export pipeline to shore, and will be subject to a formal approval process in Q1 2017.
Front-end engineering and design contracts for the project are expected to be awarded during Q1.
Image: The Catcher FPSO. Image from Aibel.
Subscribe
