Lukoil Advances Caspian Field Expansion
Russian independent Lukoil said July 31 it has completed transportation and started installation of the substructure for the wellhead platform at its Vladimir Filanovsky field in the Caspian Sea.
The platform – a mini offshore ice-resistant fixed platform – is being built as part of the third stage of the field, implemented to develop the western part of the reservoir and maintain stable production plateau. Starting 2019, it will produce and gather crude oil, and supply it to the central processing platform that was built during phase one of the field's development.
The field was discovered in 2005 and started production in October 2016; its initial recoverable reserves amount to 129mn metric tons of crude oil and 30bn m3 of gas. Phase two production began in 2017.
Lukoil is also the only company operating Russian fields (Filanovsky and Korchagin) in the Caspian Sea; together in 2017 these produced 2mn mt/yr of oil and 1.2bn m3/yr of associated gas.
The substructure for the new wellhead platform (see photo below) was built at the Galaktika shipyard in Astrakhan and transported to the installation site via the Volga-Caspian Shipping Canal. Lukoil-Nizhnevolzhskneft is building the topside for the wellhead platform at its construction and assembly yard. Nearly all operations of the new facility will be automated.
(Credit: Lukoil)