BAKU, Azerbaijan, September 28. bp has completed its multi-well subsea intervention campaign in the Caspian Sea almost a month ahead of schedule.
The campaign, launched last October in the Deepwater Gunashli area of the Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli (ACG) field, has reached all planned objectives safely, said Russell Morrice, bp’s vice president for wells.
“The campaign targeted seven subsea wells that had previously been
considered difficult to access using conventional intervention
methods. By completing intervention activities on these wells, we
were able to carry out efficient surveillance and identify
opportunities for reservoir pressure management and production rate
enhancement, helping unlock further potential in the field,” he
noted.
He pointed out that the campaign marked the first deployment of
riserless light well intervention (RLWI) technology in bp’s
operations in the Caspian.
“To make this possible, the Khankendi subsea construction vessel
was successfully converted into a light well intervention vessel
(LWIV) within just a few months, an impressive achievement by the
teams involved. A key part of that transformation was the
installation and first-time use of a moonpool system aboard
Khankendi. Located near the vessel's centerline, the moonpool
provides a sheltered vertical opening through the hull, enabling
the safe deployment of subsea equipment, remotely operated vehicles
and intervention tools directly to the seabed,” added bp’s
vice-president.
Morrice noted that at the heart of the operation was Oceaneering's
Blue Ocean Riserless Intervention System (BORIS), an advanced
subsea mechanical wireline intervention system that enables access
to subsea wells without conventional drilling risers.
“Despite weighing around 50 tonnes, BORIS was successfully
deployed from the vessel and provided well control, pressure
containment, and full subsea control throughout intervention
activities while maintaining multiple independent well barriers.
This highly complex project brought together expertise from across
bp and some of our key contractors, including Saipem, Oceaneering
and SLB, spanning engineering, subsea technologies, vessel
operations, fabrication, logistics and well services,” he said.
BP Exploration (Caspian Sea) Limited is the operator on behalf of
the Contractor Parties to the ACG Production Sharing Agreement.
ACG participating interests are: bp (operator - 30.37%), SOCAR (35.30%), MOL (9.57%), INPEX (9.31%), ExxonMobil (6.79%), TPAO (5.73%), ONGC Videsh (2.92%).
In the first half of the year, ACG commenced Non-associated gas (NAG) production operations, marking the first-ever commercial gas production operations in this field.
