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Eni onshore pipeline work on schedule Nikaitchuq developer has offshore island in place, laid 3.8-mile pipeline bundle to shore last winter; working onshore connection Kristen Nelson Petroleum News
After slowing the pace of its Nikaitchuq project on Alaska’s North Slope last year, Eni Petroleum is on schedule for first production from the field’s onshore pad this December, and for first production from the field’s offshore drilling pad south of Spy Island in December of 2011.
Crude oil from Nikaitchuq will be the first production on the North Slope not processed through facilities operated by either BP or ConocoPhillips.
Production was initially scheduled to begin in December 2009, but the Alaska Division of Oil and Gas said (in a May 2009 decision extending the term of the Nikaitchuq unit by two years) that Eni revamped the project after work stoppage at the Houma, La., fabrication yard due to Hurricane Ike, a drop in oil prices from $140 a barrel to $40 a barrel and worldwide economic conditions.
Work on those facilities in Louisiana is now nearing completion, Larry Burgess, the company’s Alaska health, safety and environment manager, told the Alaska Support Industry Alliance Jan. 28.
The facilities will come by sealift this summer from the construction site at Houma, La., he said. The two large modules — a process facility and a utilities facility — are scheduled for completion in April and will be loaded for the trip to the North Slope in May.
“We have four turbines in the utility module we’ll be running. We’ll generate our own electricity.
“All the oil that we produce will be run through our process facilities, not through ConocoPhillips or BP. We’re standalone completely,” Burgess said.
In addition to the large sealift modules, Eni is constructing truckable modules in Anchorage.
Work completed Eni has completed an 11-acre island 3.8 miles offshore, just north of Oliktok Point, Burgess said, along with an onshore drill site at Oliktok Point. Nabors rig 245E has begun drilling at the onshore pad; that drilling will start up again in June.
Last year a 3.8-mile subsea pipeline bundle was installed, by trenching through the sea down into the sea floor. The pipeline bundle was buried with materials dredged up in the trenching work.
“We had to ground the ice all the way out to the island,” Burgess said, “… building an ice road and grounding the sea ice to the sea floor so we can take heavy equipment out.”
Burgess said Eni has a grind-and-inject facility at its onshore Oliktok Point pad, with one disposal well on site.
“We’re going to drill another one offshore. And we’ll have a grind-and-inject facility offshore as well, for disposal of Class 1 and Class 2 wastes as well as the cutting spoils.
“This project is a zero-discharge project,” he said.
Onshore pipeline this winter Eni has 14 miles of ice roads complete now, and is on schedule to complete the onshore pipeline this winter. The pipeline will take processed oil from the Oliktok Point facility to a connection with a ConocoPhillips pipeline which goes to Pump Station 1 of the trans-Alaska oil pipeline.
The sealift of the large modules from Louisiana is scheduled to begin in June, Burgess said, and to arrive at the North Slope in August.
Hook up of the facilities is scheduled to be completed in November and once the facilities are installed and commissioned, first oil is expected to be produced in December.
Another milestone will be offshore drilling, scheduled to begin in September 2011; hook up of facilities at the offshore drill site will be completed and the facility commissioned in November 2011, with first oil from the offshore pad scheduled for December 2011.
The facilities are rated at 40,000 barrels per day, Burgess said, with expected production of 28,000 bpd, and the life of the field is estimated at 40 years, based on equipment, but with technology it could run longer.
International company While Eni is a small player in Alaska, the company is the world’s fifth- or sixth- largest oil and gas company, Burgess said, and the third-largest producer in the Gulf of Mexico.
Nikaitchuq is not the only project Eni has in Alaska.
The company also has leases at North Tarn, Rock Flour and Maggiore onshore, in the Beaufort Sea and in the Chukchi Sea.
Eni acquired a 30 percent interest in Nikaitchuq in August 2005 when it acquired the North Slope assets of Armstrong Alaska.
In January 2007 Eni acquired the remaining 70 percent interest in Nikaitchuq from Anadarko Petroleum and sanctioned project development in January 2008.
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