In July, McKenzie said on the call, once the CGS is placed on the seabed, “we’ll bring the topsides from Bull Arm, and we'll mate them up with the gravity-based structure. From there, there's a few months of commissioning and start-up work.”
Drilling is expected by this year’s fourth quarter with an eye toward first production in second-quarter 2026, he said, noting “it's a pretty exciting time and this is becoming very real, very, very quickly.”
Cenovus is operator and majority owner of White Rose field and satellite extensions, which lie in the Jeanne d’Arc basin. The original field was developed through subsea technology, consisting of three drill centers tied back to a floating production, storage, and offloading (FPSO) vessel. The West White Rose Project will access additional resources to the west of the field through the fixed drilling platform tied back to the existing SeaRose FPSO.
Cenovus agreed in 2022 to restart the West White Rose project after acquiring the asset in a deal with its former operator, Husky Energy Inc., which had put the project up for review during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. At the rime, Cenovus said it planned for first oil from the platform in first-half 2026 and expected peak production of about 80,000 b/d by yearend 2029 (OGJ Online, Oct. 26, 2020; May 31, 2022).
The West White Rose project is expected to access 200 million bbl of light crude oil and extend the life of White Rose oil field by 14 years.
