Repsol YPF buys fields off Trinidad and Tobago

Aug. 9, 2005
Repsol YPF SA has acquired Teak, Samaan, and Poui oil fields and the undeveloped Onyx gas-condensate discovery in shallow water off southeastern Trinidad for $229 million and will invest $500 million there through 2025.

By OGJ editors
HOUSTON, Aug. 9 -- Repsol YPF SA has acquired Teak, Samaan, and Poui oil fields and the undeveloped Onyx gas-condensate discovery in shallow water off southeastern Trinidad for $229 million and will invest $500 million there through 2025.

Repsol YPF estimates the target as 174 million boe of proved, probable, and possible reserves. Seller is BP Trinidad and Tobago, in which Repsol YPF already has a 30% share. State Petrotrin will purchase a 15% stake in the project. The transaction is subject to government approval.

BPTT had announced it was to sell the fields to other buyers, but Repsol YPF exercised a first right of refusal (OGJ Online, June 20, 2005). BPTT earlier this year said proved reserves were 40 million bbl of oil.

Field developments
Now producing an average 20,500 boe/d, the three oil fields in the Columbus basin have three platforms, 10 drilling satellites, and one compression satellite.

Cumulative production exceeds 200 million bbl of oil from Samaan alone.

Development of the fields, at a cost of $275 million, will involve opening untapped pays and drilling horizontal and infill wells. It may also include acidizing and gas lift optimization.

Repsol YPF plans to start production in the third quarter of 2008 from Onyx, a 1971 discovery identified by the oil exploration wells Tourmaline-1A and 2A and Nariva-1. Gas formations were not tested.

Onyx is in 200 ft of water between Poui and Teak fields. Repsol YPF is considering a subsea development linked by pipeline to the Poui facilities.

Caribbean growth
The acquisition cements Repsol YPF's already large position in the Caribbean. Besides its 30% participation in BPTT's 1,110 sq km, Repsol YPF owns 20% in train one and 25% in trains two and three at the Atlantic LNG gas liquefaction plant. It holds 22.2% in train four, the world's largest, set to start up in the fourth quarter of 2005.

Repsol YPF's net production in the country in 2004, all from fields operated by BPTT, averaged 16,700 b/d of liquids and 550 MMcfd of gas.

Repsol YPF's planned Caribbean investments total $2.2 billion in 2005-09, including $1.25 billion in Trinidad and Tobago.

Petrotrin produces 85,000 boe/d, exports 80 MMcfd of gas as LNG through its NCMA unit, and refines 160,000 b/d, of which it exports 140,000 b/d.