Azerbaijan, Baku, July 12 / Trend S.Aliyev /
"A platform to be built under the Chirag Oil Project (COP) will be the largest of all platforms existing on the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli field", COP Project Head Ilgar Mammadov said today.
The Chirag oil project envisages the construction of a new platform called West Chirag. The platform will be installed at a depth of 170 meters between the already-running production platforms Chirag and Guneshli.
Mammadov said the total weight of the platform will be more than 37,000 tons and the daily volume of its production, about 180,000 barrels.
A support block of the new platform will be sent to sea in the fourth quarter of 2012. The topsides will be sent to sea in the second quarter of 2013.
Construction of major export gas and oil pipelines is not provided. The platform will be connected to existing submarine export pipelines to deliver raw materials to the Sangachal terminal.
The platform on the deepwater Guneshli field will be stopped for 33 days in the third quarter of 2012 so that the new platform can be connected with the pipelines. This will occur at the same time as preventive work in this field.
The Chirag oil project envisages $6 billion in investments.
In total, 300 million barrels of oil are expected to be produced under the project until the end of the ACG contract in 2024.
The ACG contract was signed in 1994.
ACG participating interests are BP with 35.83 percent, Chevron - 11.27, Inpex - 10.96 percent, AzACG - 11.6 percent, Statoil - 8.56 percent, Exxon - 8 percent, ТРАО - 6.75 percent, Itocu - 4.3 percent, and Hess - 2.72 percent.
In 2010, 40.6 million tons of oil was produced from the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli field compared to more than 40.3 million tons in 2009. Average daily oil production on this block amounted to 823,100 barrels per day in 2010