Chevron increases Permian production 11% y-o-y

Chevron Corp. increased its Permian basin production 11% year-over-year to 772,000 boe/d in this year’s second quarter. The operator updated investors on its Permian basin production—a new quarterly record—as well as another upstream asset, the affiliate TengizChevroil LLP (TCO), in an earnings preview July 24.

Early 2023 Permian well performance in company-operated assets is on track with full year guidance, the company continued. In April, the company said it was allocating more than $4 billion to its Permian basin development.

The TCO project in Kazakhstan remains on schedule, on budget, and major projects are 98% complete with about 66% progress on pre-startup commissioning activities, the operator said.

TCO’s expansion, the integrated Future Growth Project-Wellhead Pressure Management Project (FGP-WPMP), is designed to increase crude oil production from Tengiz by 260,000 b/d. The FGP will use sour gas injection technology, developed during TCO’s previous expansion in 2008, to increase daily crude oil production while the WPMP will extend the field’s production plateau and keep existing plants producing at full capacity (OGJ Online, Nov. 4, 2019).

Estimated oil in place in Tengiz field is 25.5 billion bbl, with 1.6 billion bbl in Korolev field. Total recoverable crude oil between the two fields is estimated at 7.1-10.9 billion bbl.

Chevron holds 50% interest in TCO. Partners are KazMunayGas, ExxonMobil Kazakhstan, and LukArco.

For the quarter, Chevron had earnings of $6 billion and adjusted earnings of $5.8 billion, driven by international upstream and US downstream.

The quarter’s earnings are down from first-quarter 2023 when the company reported earnings of $6.6 billion and adjusted earnings of $6.7 billion.