South East Mananda oil field comes on stream

March 28, 2006
Oil Search Ltd., Sydney, started production from its $145 million South East Mananda oil field development project in the southern highlands of Papua New Guinea. Oil Search received development approval for the field early last year (OGJ, Feb. 14, 2005, Newsletter).

Rick Wilkinson
OGJ Correspondent

MELBOURNE, Mar. 28 -- Oil Search Ltd., Sydney, started production from its $145 million South East Mananda oil field development project in the southern highlands of Papua New Guinea. Oil Search received development approval for the field early last year (OGJ, Feb. 14, 2005, Newsletter).

The field started flow from one well. Oil Search will link three other wells to the gathering system to raise production to 7,000 b/d of oil by May.

Development of South East Mananda has had to overcome a number of technical and commercial challenges, including complex geology, high-altitude drilling, and the laying of 16 km of parallel oil, gas-lift, and chemical pipelines in a remote, high-rainfall area.

Oil Search built an innovative 470-m cable suspension bridge to carry the bundle of pipelines across 400-m deep Hegigio Gorge, which separates South East Mananda from Agogo field facilities, the nearest entry into the Kutubu production hub.

Oil is mingled with production from other highland fields and piped south to the Kumul loading facilities in the Gulf of Papua.

South East Mananda was discovered in 1991. The development was the first for Oil Search as operator. Oil Search has 72.27% of the field, while AGL Gas Developments has 11.9%, Merlin Petroleum 7.93%, and Petroleum Resources Kutubu 7.9%.