Page 8 - Euroil Week 40 2019

EurOil POLICY EurOil
Turkish drillship set to spud East Med well
CYPRUS
Turkey has sought to stamp its authority on the waters surrounding Cyprus.
TURKISH Energy Minister Fatih Donmez said this week that the country’s Yavuz drillship would begin work on an exploration well south- west of Cyprus, leading to heightened tensions between the countries.
Speaking at a conference on October 6, Don- mez said: “All preparations have been completed, and [Yavuz] will start its rst drilling in the area either today or tomorrow.”
On Monday, Reuters cited Re nitiv Eikon shipping data as showing that the Yavuz was located around 90km south-west of Cyprus, near acreage held by Italy’s Eni and French super-ma- jor Total.
Turkey has sought to stamp its authority on the waters surrounding Cyprus.
In January, during a meeting in Nicosia with Turkish-Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci, Turk- ish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said that Turkey would send a drillship to the “Cyprus area” in February.
Turkey acquired the Fatih drillship in 2018 and Cavusoglu said that a second would be delivered in February. “We were going to send it to the Black Sea, now we are sending it to the Cyprus area. Our drillship Fatih is currently in
the Alanya-1 area. Its work there will be done in March. We are shi ing that to the south too,” Cavusoglu said.
He added that Ankara had taken this decision because the Republic of Cyprus – a member of the EU, internationally recognised and this week hosting the Summit of Southern EU Countries – had failed to accept Turkey’s “suggestions” that ensure the rights of Turkish-Cypriots.
e government of Cyprus has said repeat- edly that all Cypriot citizens, [[excluding]] Turkish settlers living in northern Cyprus, will share the bene ts of any and all hydrocar- bon discoveries and their monetisation once there is a settlement to the 45-year-old Cyprus problem.
E orts are underway now to convene a new round of talks between the Republic and the Turkish-Cypriot administration. e last round failed last year because Turkey insisted on being the guarantor of any agreement and keeping troops stationed on the island.
The Cypriot Foreign Ministry dismissed Turkey’s claims that its e orts in the East Med to prevent exploration are intended to safeguard the rights of Turkish-Cypriots. ™
POLICY
Subsea 7 hired for Shell gas project
UK
The project will commercialise gas at an oil eld.
OSLO-LISTED contractor Subsea 7 has been hired for engineering, procurement, construc- tion, transportation and installation (EPCI) work worth up to $150mn at Shell’s Pierce Depressurisation project in the UK central North Sea.
The contract covers a 30-km gas export pipeline, a gas export riser and associated sub- sea infrastructure, to tie Pierce’s facilities to the Bluewater-owned Haewene Brim oating pro- duction, storage and o oading (FPSO) vessel, it said on October 4. Project management and detailed engineering has already begun at Sub- sea 7’s Aberdeen o ce, with o shore activities scheduled for 2020 and 2021.
“ is award recognises our extensive knowl- edge of Shell’s North Sea developments, gained over almost 30 years of working closely together to deliver safe and cost-e ective construction, inspection, repair and maintenance operations across Shell’s European o shore elds and facil- ities,” Subsea 7’s vice president for the UK and Canada, Jonathan Tame, said in a statement on October 4.
Subsea 7 said the contract was “sizeable”, put- ting its value at somewhere between $50mn and $150mn.
Shell and its UK partner Ithaca Energy took a nal investment decision (FID) on the Pierce project on October 3. It is aimed at launching commercial production of gas at the eld, all of which is currently re-injected to maintain pres- sure in oil reservoirs.
“This important development of the Pierce eld will allow us to unlock additional gas reserves for the UK’s homes and businesses, and value for our shareholders,” Steve Phimister, vice president of Shell UK’s upstream division commented.
e project includes modi cation of the Hae- wene Brime FPSO, and installation of a new gas export line connecting the vessel with the Segal pipeline, and the drilling of new wells. Once ready, it will yield more than 30,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day of gas at peak, with a break- even price of around $20 per barrel.
Shell controls a 92.5% stake in Pierce, some 257 km o Aberdeen, while Delek-owned Ithaca holds the remaining 7.5%. ™
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Week 40 10•October•2019