BP, having sanctioned Phase-1 development of the 15tcf Tortue field on the Mauritania/Senegal maritime border at the end of 2018, is not standing still. “We’ve got FIDs coming up: the Gulf of Mexico, the North Sea, Azerbaijan, Mauritania,” CEO Bob Dudley told his firm’s Q4 earnings call on 5 February. Upstream chief Bernard Looney adds that having “just sanctioned Phase-1 of Tortue, we’ve got Phases 2, 3 and 4 to go.” Phase-1 is slated to produce 2.5mn t/y of LNG from 1H 2022 with the three subsequent phases to take output to 10mn t/y by the mid-2020s (MEES, 4 January).
BP and Kosmos plan three wells at Tortue in 2019. The aim is to “optimize” the future development drilling program, to “get the right levels of deliverability with the optimum well pattern,” Kosmos CEO Andy Inglis says. Raising the proved reserves figure will be a happy side-effect. “I think that it’ll add resource but… as you know, we’re not short of resource on Tortue. So, adding the resource doesn’t actually in that sense make a difference. What it does do is to make sure that you’re ultimately optimizing the development program to get the best wells into the front end of the development,” Mr Inglis says. (CONTINUED - 615 WORDS)
