BP today announced the award of several major contracts for the appraisal of the giant Khazzan/ Makarem gas fields in Oman’s Block 61 awarded to BP in January. These include contracts for seismic acquisition services, seismic reprocessing, select stage engineering and drilling rigs.
The US’ Global Geophysical Services has been awarded the contract for seismic acquisition. The company will begin to shoot 3D seismic over most of the 2,800 square kilometres of the acreage at the end of the year.
Cairo-based PGS Data Processing ME has been awarded the contract for processing of the new seismic and re-processing of the existing seismic data over the concession area.
The contract for the select stage engineering of the Khazzan/Makarem project has been awarded to Worley Parsons Oman. The scope of services under the select stage engineering include evaluation of options for the appraisal phase of early production of the Khazzan/Makarem gas fields
Oman-based Dalma Energy & Co LLC has been chosen to supply two rigs, with drilling planned to commence by the end of 2008.
BP signed an exploration and production sharing agreement for the appraisal and development of the Khazzan/Makarem fields in January 2007. The contracts awarded mark the beginning of a multi-year appraisal programme to understand the nature of the reservoirs which contain difficult to extract ‘tight’ gas.
“These contract awards represent a critical milestone in BP's multi-year commitment to assess the development potential of the gas resources in Block 61. Together with our excellent working relationship with the government of the Sultanate of Oman, this allows us to move forward with a high degree of confidence in the success of this strategically important project," said Michael Townshend, President, BP Oman.
