By the OGJ Online Staff
HOUSTON, July 23 -- Statoil AS said Monday that Lufeng field off China yielded more than 26 million bbl of oil between its start-up in December 1997 and early July.
That exceeded the forecast of 25 million bbl when the decision was made to develop the South China Sea field.
Holger Boge, field operator Statoil's operations vice-president, said plans are for Lufeng to produce until the end of June 2003. A total of 31 million bbl could be produced by then, a recovery factor of roughly 30%.
Boge said, "Production regularity from the field has been 99.4% so far, and all technical aspects are functioning very well."
The oil content in produced water being discharged to the sea is around 15 mg/l., compared with a government requirement of less than 50 mg/l.
Statoil has a 75% interest through its Statoil (Orient) Inc. subsidiary. The state-owned China National Offshore Oil Corp. holds the rest.
Lufeng is being produced by the Navion Munin multipurpose shuttle tanker and five subsea wells. Production is 9,000 b/d.
Recently, Bluewater Group agreed to purchase the Navion Munin vessel from Navion, in which Statoil owns 80%.