KUWAIT, June 5 (KUNA) -- Chevron Saudi Arabia, which operates Wafra oil field in cooperation with the Kuwait Gulf Oil Company, said that preliminary results of the steam inundation project at Wafra field are so promising.
Chairman of the company Ahmed Awad Al-Omar said in a press statement that the initial results at the joint operations as well as the simulation model and other studies that are subject to assessment, aim to produce more than 500, 000 barrels of oil per day while the amount of explorable oil is more than 6 billion barrels.
He added that the injection of steam inundation in the first Eocene reservoir in Wafra has increased production by more than 600 percent of the primary production (without steam injection), showing that the cost of this phase rose to more than USD 350 million.
He pointed out that the project requires the drilling of 10,000 wells for production and steam injection and monitoring of temperatures in addition to the installation of large separate facilities to generate energy and steam, anticipating the issuance of the decision to invest in the development of the entire field in late 2013, while the first phase of steam injection in the Eocene would begin by 2017.
He said the potential impact of the inundation of steam would be "very large", adding that over the past 60 years, the traditional pumping had contributed to the extraction of about (5) percent of the oil that is already existing in the first Eocene reservoir, noting that the extraction of another one percent from this reservoir alone will add more than 100 million barrels to Wafra field's confired reserves.
Al-Omar said that the quantity contained in the first Eocene reservoir is estimated at nine billion barrels of oil, while separate tests are underway for steam inundation at the second Eocene reservoir that is a little deeper in Wafra.
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