ExxonMobil Guyana has confirmed that Noble Corporation has been contracted by the US super-major for an offshore campaign in the Stabroek Block, located 120 miles offshore the South American country.
The 2013-built Noble Bob Douglas drillship will commence operations at the Liza field next year for what is expected to be a 3-year period.
“I can confirm that we’ve contracted the Noble rig for the Liza Phase 1 development program starting in the first half of 2018,” Kimberly Brasington, ExxonMobil’s Senior Director, Public and Government Affairs, told OilNOW on Saturday.
According to Noble’s fleet status report, the drillship in July ended its contract with Murphy Oil in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, and will move to Suriname in early October. Once in Suriname, the rig will start a one-month contract with Tullow, which will be hoping to replicate the recent exploration success made by Exxon in nearby Guyana, when it struck large amounts of oil in Liza and Payara wells.
ExxonMobil along with its joint venture partners Hess and Nexen are proceeding with the first phase of development for the prolific Liza field. The Liza Phase 1 development includes a subsea production system and a floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel designed to produce up to 120,000 barrels of oil per day. Production is expected to begin by 2020, less than five years after discovery of the field. Phase 1 is expected to cost just over $4.4 billion, which includes a lease capitalization cost of approximately $1.2 billion for the FPSO facility, and will develop approximately 500 million barrels of oil.
The Liza field is located in water depths of 1,500 to 1,900 meters. Four drill centers are envisioned with a total of 17 wells, including eight production wells, six water injection wells and three gas injection wells.
The Stena Carron continues to drill offshore Guyana.
