Technip, Mustang win key engineering contracts for U.S. Gulf’s Tahiti project

Ray Tyson

Petroleum News Houston correspondent

ChevronTexaco has awarded two major engineering contracts for development of Tahiti’s sub-sea systems and floating production facility, to be located in Green Canyon blocks 640, 641 and 596, about 190 miles southwest of New Orleans, La.

Tahiti, with 400 million to 500 million barrels of estimated oil reserves, is among the largest discoveries in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico.

Under the agreement, Technip Offshore will perform front-end engineering and design for the proposed truss spar floating production facility, ChevronTexaco said April 15, adding that Mustang Engineering will perform the same for the Tahiti topsides oil and gas processing facilities.

Construction contracts are expected to be awarded in the second quarter of 2005, ChevronTexaco said.

“We are pleased to announce these key contract awards that move our Tahiti Project closer to first production,” said Ray Wilcox, president of ChevronTexaco Exploration and Production Co. “Tahiti is a significant component of ChevronTexaco’s upstream growth strategy. It will also add considerably to our Gulf of Mexico deepwater portfolio.”

The Tahiti field will be developed from two subsea drill centers near the two Tahiti appraisal wells in Green Canyon blocks 596 and 640, completed in early 2003. One of the wells encountered more than 1,000 feet of net pay.

Next steps for the project include front-end engineering and additional technical and commercial assessments, ChevronTexaco said A production test of the discovery well and front-end engineering are scheduled to begin the second quarter of 2004, the company said.

ChevronTexaco is the operator of the Tahiti project with a 58 percent working interest. EnCana holds a 25 percent stake in the project, followed by Shell Exploration & Production with a 17 percent interest.