Esso REP, Esso's E&P arm in France, is pursuing offshore opportunities, attempting to limit declines in onshore oil fields, and cutting operational costs.
Esso Rep has been looking for a partner the past two years to start its assessment of the offshore potential of the Bay of Biscay, where it holds the Aquitaine Maritime and Cap Ferret Ocean permits. The search for a partner goes on.
Esso France chairman and chief executive officer Patrick Heinzle laid the lack of enthusiasm for prospecting in France to the tax conditions, in particular the government's scrapping of the depletion allowance.
Esso Rep's onshore oil production fell 11% to 7,160 b/d in 2001, and that decline and lower oil prices led to a 25% drop in operating profit year to year. Esso Rep still remains France's largest oil producer, accounting for 30% of production.
Warding off decline entails maintaining well operations at the high level of 95% and seizing all drilling opportunities and workover of wells on the Les Pins and Courbey blocks in the Aquitaine basin and Chaunoy in the Paris basin. Esso Rep drilled a well last year at Courbey and is studying further work there. It boosted production from Les Arbousiers by 36%, but output of all other fields was down. Decline at Chaunoy was limited to 9% compared with 11% in 2000.
All opportunities will be taken to cut costs, Heinzle said. Production investments in 2002 will be higher than 2001's EU9 million because three holes are planned, two at Chaunoy and one at Les Pins.
