Marine Technology Reporter Blogs - discoveries

Statoil recently increased the estimates for their Campos Basin pre-salt O&G discoveries up to a substantial total of 1.24 billion barrels boe. Consequently Statoil has also increased its optimism for the geologically similar plays it has in Angola. Not only are the cross ocean plays geologically similar but they are also located along the same longitude. Both pre-salt geological formations off the Brazilian and West African coasts have their origins in common, something that goes back around 120 million years ago, when ancient Gondwana split into what is now known as South America and Africa. The pre-salt reservoirs on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean are expected to contain large quantities of light oil.

Paulo Mendonça, CEO of OGX stated that the first quarter of 2011 was very important for the Brazilian operator. OGX has been intensifying the campaign to appraise its discoveries in the Campos basin, where 16 wells have been spud since the beginning of the year, of which 10 are appraisal wells for the accumulations Waikiki, Pipeline and Illimani (Campos Basin) and Fazenda São José (Parnaíba Basin), with the intent of converting 3C contingent resources into 2C and 1C, and thereafter into reserves. -Delivering the vital and time sensitive declaration of commerciality to ANP (National O&G regulator), related to the discoveries in Campos, Santos and Parnaíba Basins.

After a nearly perfect drilling campaign on various fronts in 2010, OGX start 2011 with new discoveries in the Campos Basin. Although there was much skepticism at the start of OGX´s creation in 2007, after last year´s performance, the new Brazilian operator, which was created by Brazilian businessman and investor Eike Batista adding to the portfolio of his EBX Group can now easily be considered as a good investment, especially for those who bought in early. Eike´s strategy to hire and partner with Petrobras´s extraordinary geologist and executive Paulo Mendonça was vital not only to gain market value as to bring in deep knowledge of where do drill and how to plan the E&P campaign. It´s important to not that Petrobras´s exploratory success rate more than doubled after Mr.

The oil industry in Brazil finishes the year with intense activity on all fronts and the efforts are massive. However the risks taken on the deepwater projects and older production rigs may still lead to major spills if not kept in check.Petrobras recently discovered light oil in sandstones reservoirs in the post-salt section of the Espírito Santo Basin. The discovery was the result of the drilling of the 1-BRSA-882-ESS well, known as Indra, located within the BM-ES-32 Block. Petrobras holds a 60% stake and is the operator, Statoil holds the remaining 40%. It is located 140 km from the city of Vitória and was drilled to approximately 3,850 m, from a water depth of approximately 2,100 m, and is the deepest oil discovery at Espírito Santo Basin.

The two new discoveries in one well, announced by Petrobras last Thursday, strengthen the thesis pertaining to the possibility of the existence of a great reservoir beneath the salt layer of the Campos Basin. The Campos Basin pre-salt shows its potential even if volumes are less than at the Santos Basin, as various factors related to logistics, production timeline and development costs make this possibility very attractive to players and specially to Petrobras. As is widely known, the Campos Basin is presently responsible for over 80% of the Brazilian O&G production. The discoveries indicate the existence of hydrocarbons in both the pre-salt and the post-salt layers in a single well at the Barracuda field in the Campos Basin, 100km from the coast of  Rio de Janeiro.

PROCAP 3000: next ultra-deepwater exploration frontier.Over the past 23 years, Petrobras, forerunner in the use of the floating production concept, has always emphasized innovation and upgrade based on its professional expertise. The first PROCAP – Technological Development Program for Deepwater Production Systems was launched in 1986 in order to improve the company’s technical skills in oil and natural gas production in water until 1,000m. To do so, Albacora and Marlin fields were chosen as a development unit. The results obtained in this first program and the other discoveries in deeper water encouraged the company to create a new program in 1993, PROCAP-2000 - Technological Development Program for Deepwater Exploration Systems.