Page 13 - FSUOGM Week 34 2021

FSUOGM PROJECTS & COMPANIES FSUOGM

BP, SOCAR sink first SWAP well

off Azerbaijan

AZERBAIJAN BP and its Azeri partner SOCAR have spudded “A great deal of preparation has been made
their first exploration well at the Shallow Water to assure a safe and robust drilling programme
The well is targeting the Absheron Peninsula (SWAP) area in the Caspian using our experience and advanced technol-
North Khali prospect. Sea. ogy solutions from other shallow water areas
The well is targeting the North Khali pros- around the world,” BP’s regional president for
pect. It is the first of three wells planned by BP Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey, Gary Jones,
and SOCAR in the SWAP area, which the part- added.
ners signed a production-sharing agreement BP had hoped to drill the first SWAP well
(PSA) for back in 2014. as early as 2019, as part of a broader explora-
The North Khali well is set to reach a depth tion campaign off the coast of Azerbaijan. It is
of 2,424 metres within two and a half months. It thought to contain reservoirs between 2,000
is being drilled by the Satti jack-up rig, on loan and 5,000 metres deep, although neither the UK
from Kazakhstan’s state-owned KazMunayGas major nor its partner have disclosed estimates
(KMG). The project partners had hoped to spud for possible resources.
the well back in 2019, but had to delay the work The partners undertook a 3D seismic survey
because the rig was not ready. Prior to drilling, at the SWAP area in 2016. The environmen-
Satti underwent modernisation at a shipyard in tal and socio-economic impact assessment for
Baku. the first well was approved by the government
“This demonstrates the recent development in January, and a draft document for a second
of co-operation between companies of the coun- borehole was disclosed in July and is undergo-
tries of the Caspian region,” SOCAR President ing public discussions, which should end this
Rovnag Abdullayev said in a statement. month.™

Lukoil starts on Perm

catalytic cracker

RUSSIA RUSSIA’S largest independent oil producer In other Lukoil news, the company is
Lukoil has broken ground on a catalytic crack- reportedly looking to form a joint venture to
The project is backed ing unit at its refinery in Perm, the company process associated gas at the Lokosovsky gas
by an investment deal announced on August 20. processing plant with another private player,
with the government. The project is backed by an investment agree- Russneft.
ment between Lukoil and Russia’s energy min- “Russneft and Lukoil are discussing an option
istry, which gives refiners a subsidy on refining to create a joint venture at the Lokosovsky gas
feedstock in return for commitments to upgrade refinery to upgrade the existing facilities and
their facilities. The cracking unit is due online in infrastructure for associated gas processing,” a
2026 and will process up to 1.8mn tonnes per source told the Prime news agency on August 20.
year (tpy) of feedstock at full capacity. “An economic analysis of the project has shown
The start of construction comes some weeks that the creation of an integrated platform for gas
after Lukoil also started work on a new poly- processing can diversify the historically devel-
propylene plant at another of its key refineries oped gas supply scheme in the region, improve
in Nizhny Novgorod. That facility will produce the economy, and the project’s metrics, and sub-
up to 500,000 tpy of polypropylene, using some stantially reduce the price risks.”
of the 4mn tpy of propylene feedstock that the The Lokosovsky facility accounts for more
refinery currently produces. than a third of Lukoil’s gas processing capacity,
Another recent upgrade to Russia’s refining handling around 1.47bn cubic metres of gas in
capacity was completed by Gazprom Neft at its 2019. Situated in Russia’s oil heartland of Khan-
refinery in Moscow in late July. The company ty-Mansiysk, the facility handles gas from the
launched production of very low sulphur fuel oil, company’s Western Siberian fields, stripping it
for delivery to St Petersburg as a shipping fuel. of LPG and various impurities. ™

Week 34 25•August•2021 www. NEWSBASE .com P13