(Oil & Gas Journal) Petroleo Brasileiro SA (Petrobras) signed a letter of intent with SBM Offshore for a 22.5-year lease and operation of the Mero 2 floating production, storage, and offloading vessel to be installed on giant Mero oil field in the Santos basin offshore Brazil.
SBM Offshore is to design and build the FPSO with capacities to handle production of 180,000 b/d of oil and injection of 250,000 b/d of water. The vessel will have associated-gas treatment capacity of 12 million cu m/day and minimum storage capacity of 1.4 million bbl of oil.
Topside modules will weigh about 33,000 tons. The FPSO will be spread-moored in about 2,000 m of water 180 km offshore Rio de Janeiro.
The Mero 1 Guanabara MV31 FPSO is due onstream in 2021 with oil and gas-handling capacities identical to those of the Mero 2 (OGJ Online, Oct. 5, 2018). It’s being built by MODEC.
Delivery of the Mero 2 is expected in 2022.
Interests in the Libra production-sharing contract covering Mero are Petrobras, the operator, 40%; Royal Dutch Shell PLC and Total SA, 20% each; and China National Petroleum Corp. and CNOOC Ltd., 10% each. State-owned Pre-Sal Petroleo is contract manager.
