Sinochem to buy Total's Cusiana, pipeline interests

Feb. 8, 2012
Sinochem is buying Total SA’s Colombian subsidiary TEPMA BV, and the French company plans to maintain its exploration interests in Colombia.

Sinochem is buying Total SA’s Colombian subsidiary TEPMA BV, and the French company plans to maintain its exploration interests in Colombia.

The sale to Sinochem includes Total’s working interest in supergiant Cusiana field, producing 7,000 b/d of oil equivalent net to Total, and participations in the OAM and ODC pipelines. Relevant authorities must approve the sale, which is a continuation of Total’s asset optimization strategy.

Total said it will come away with $1 billion from the sale to Sinochem and the mid-2011 divestitures of a 5% working interest in the Ocensa pipeline to Petrominerales and another 5% to CEPSA. Total still holds a 5.2% share in Ocensa.

Total plans to maintain its exploration interests in Colombia. It holds 55% interest in the Mundo Nuevo block and 50% in the Niscota block to the south, where the Huron-2 appraisal well is being drilled and Huron-3 is to spud later in 2012.

At Niscota, a group led by operator Hocol SA drilled a “significant gas-condensate field discovery” at Huron-1 in early 2009. Huron-1, in a heavily faulted area of the Andes foothills 300 km northeast of Bogota in the Llanos basin, encountered several reservoirs, one of which was tested at 3,400 b/d of condensate. Gas volume was not disclosed.