H H Sayyid Haitham inaugurates Khazzan
Muscat - The first phase of development of Oman’s giant Khazzan gas field was officially inaugurated by H H Sayyid Haitham bin Tariq al Said, Minister of Heritage and Culture for Oman and Bob Dudley, BP’s Group Chief Executive.
Speaking at the Khazzan field, Dudley said, “It is an honour to be here in Oman on this momentous occasion. Although this marks just the beginning of operations for Khazzan, we already had been working towards this for ten years, building close relationships with Oman and our partners. I expect these will continue to grow and deepen.
“Visiting this huge project that we have together built here in just a few years, I can see why it has been described as ‘the city in the sand’ and this city will deliver benefits for Oman and BP for decades to come. With an estimated 10.5tn cubic feet of recoverable gas resources in place in Khazzan, this is very much just the start of the journey.”
Eng Isam bin Saud al Zidjali, CEO of Oman Oil Company commented, “As an investment arm of the sultanate in the energy sectors; we at Oman Oil are honoured to be part of the Khazzan Project and help maximise the value of Oman’s natural resources. I am delighted by the fact that the project has contributed to the sustainable development of the nation on many fronts, including human capital development, new technology applications and social responsibility, to name only a few.”
Phase One of the Khazzan development will include a total of 200 wells feeding into a twotrain central processing facility. At peak, the Phase One development involved a workforce of around 13,500. Phase One production is expected to plateau at 1bn cubic feet of gas per day (bcf/d).
When the second phase of development of the Khazzan field – known as Ghazeer - is fully onstream total production is expected rise to 1.5 bcf/d. In total, approximately 300 wells are expected to be drilled over the estimated lifetime of these two phases of development of the Khazzan field.
The Phase One development started gas production in September 2017, ten years after the signing of BP’s production sharing contract with Oman and almost four years after the development was approved.
H E Dr Mohammed al Rumhy, Minister of Oil and Gas of the Sultanate of Oman, had stated at the time of commencing operations, “I am delighted to see BP delivering Phase One of the Khazzan Project ahead of time and under budget. This will result in realising more gas reserves and more production of gas that our country needs to support our energy planning and requirements.”
BP expects to start up seven major upstream projects in 2017 - making it one of the most important years for commissioning new projects in BP’s history. These seven projects are expected to make a significant contribution to the 800,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day of production from new projects that BP expects to add by 2020.
“Khazzan further demonstrates BP’s ability to consistently deliver large, complex projects on schedule and within budget while applying the industry-leading skills and technology we’ve developed globally,” Dudley said. “In this case, tight gas techniques we perfected in the US have been brought to Oman and we are very pleased with the results.”
The Khazzan tight gas reserves lie at depths of up to 5km in narrow bands of extremely hard, dense rock. These complex and challenging conditions require specialised drilling equipment, the precise drilling of both vertical and horizontal wells, and well stimulation to free the gas.
Drilling efficiency has increased significantly during the development of the project.
While BP provided advanced seismic, hydraulic fracturing and well design expertise, many local Omani businesses contributed to the Khazzan Project. In fact, approximately 38 per cent of the total contract spend to date has been awarded to local oil and gas services companies.