Page 12 - MEOG Week 18 2021

MEOG PROJECTS & COMPANIES MEOG

Weatherford continues

Bahrain run despite delays

BAHRAIN WEATHERFORD has continued a rich vein of offshore Khaleej Al Bahrain (KAB) field, the
contract awards in Bahrain with state oil firm government’s National Oil & Gas Authority
Tatweer Petroleum Co. last week awarding the (NOGA) – Tatweer’s parent – initiated talks with
US services company four contracts worth a IOCs, primarily those engaged in the US shale
combined 7.8mn BHD ($20.9mn). industry, about developing the asset. KAB is esti-
The deals cover services including directional mated to hold 80bn barrels of tight oil.
and logging while drilling services, a contract Halliburton was contracted to carry out ini-
to purchase a lathe rotary shaft and an oil filler tial drilling and well tests in the 2,000-square km
and control unit, hire of sucker rods and oil well area, with Italy’s Eni signing an EPSA in January
pumps. 2019 to explore the 2,800 square km offshore
Meanwhile, fellow American firm Hunting is Block 1 area to the north of the main island. In
understood to be drilling four wells for Tatweer February 2020, the Italian firm signed an MoU
as the company seeks to maintain and expand with Tatweer to explore collaboration in various
production capacity. domains, including gas.
A few weeks earlier, Weatherford was Three months later, a letter of intent (LoI) was
awarded a project contract worth 12.8mn BHD signed between NOGA’s investment arm noga-
($34.1mn) for drilling and completion fluids ser- holding and shale-specialist Chevron calling
vices. This included drilling fluids and drilling for the US major to assist Tatweer in evaluating
fluid processing equipment as well as technical the basin. No further details on the terms of the
support personnel and laboratory operations. accord were disclosed.
The largest contract handed out by Tatweer in Drilling by ENI in Block 1 had been due to
recent months was a $213mn deal apportioned start in 2020, but this too was delayed on account
to Halliburton for hydraulic fracturing, flowback of the Covid-19 pandemic.
and testing services. In November, Tatweer’s director general of
petroleum exploration and development, Yahya
Offshore push on hold Al Ansari announced plans to drill eight new
Tatweer had been expected to sign exploration offshore wells to a depth of 8,000-13,000 feet
and production sharing agreements (EPSAs) (2,438-3,962 metres) and a horizontal extension
with IOCs earlier this year as part of efforts to of 914-3,000-plus metres.
monetise resources in Bahrain’s offshore, but this For Tatweer, development of the offshore
is understood to have been delayed by ongoing could be a game-changer, with the company
travel restrictions. currently producing around 45,000 bpd. Regular
The move follows significant work carried out well drilling is required to maintain flow rates –
over the past two years by Tatweer to establish in 2019 110 oil wells were drilled which yielded
target areas through an advanced aerial geolog- just 3,900 bpd of additional production.
ical survey of large swathes of land as well as a The onshore Awali field, the site of the GCC’s
high-resolution geophysical survey covering first oil find in 1932, remains the kingdom’s sole
most of its offshore and the drilling of explora- source of domestic production of around 46,000
tory wells barrels per day.
Data has now been processed with Tatweer Manama also receives a 50% share of the
understood to have identified several offshore 150,000-bpd produced by Saudi Aramco at the
areas with significant potential for oil and gas offshore Abu Sa’fah, which is pumped alongside
reserves. a further 75,000 bpd of Arabian Light crude
The company is now hoping to attract inves- from the Abqaiq processing facilities in Saudi
tors to offshore blocks. Arabia’s Eastern Province via the 350,000 bpd
Following the April 2018 discovery of the Saudi-Bahrain A-B oil pipeline.™

P12 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 18 05•May•2021