ExxonMobil and the Government on Friday night announced that oil production has started from the Liza field offshore Guyana ahead of schedule.
The company said, “the first cargo is set to be sold within several weeks.”
The Government is in talks with major International Oil Companies (IOC’s) to sell its share of the first three cargoes of oil.
Production from the first phase of the Liza field, located in the Stabroek Block, is expected to reach full capacity of 120,000 barrels of oil per day in coming months, ExxonMobil said.
Country Manager, Rod Henson in a video statement noted that the company and its partners will be ramping up production over the next months.
“In the process of startup, we start up the first well and what we typically do is we will slowly ramp up production over a series of months. This allows us to gather information on all of these wells and how they produce and it also just allows us to bring on the processing equipment in a more controlled fashion. This is to ensure that everything is done exactly right,” he said.
The concept design for the Liza Phase 1 development project features the Liza Destiny floating, production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel moored 190 kilometres offshore Guyana, and four subsea drill centres supporting 17 wells.
The company is working on a second FPSO –Liza Unity –and is also developing its Liza 2 project.
“We’re preparing for Liza phase 2 which will develop the rest of the resource in this prolific Liza field. The rest will start up in early 2022,” Henson noted.
The Liza Unity, with a capacity to produce up to 220,000 barrels of oil per day is under construction to support the Liza Phase 2 development.
Exxon is also awaiting approval from the Government for its Payara Field Development Plan which is located north of the Liza field.
The front-end engineering design is underway for a potential third FPSO, the Prosperity, to develop the Payara field upon government and regulatory approvals.
ExxonMobil anticipates that by 2025 at least five FPSOs will be producing more than 750,000 barrels per day from the Stabroek Block.
According to Exxon, approximately 1,700 of ExxonMobil’s employees and other workers supporting its activities in Guyana are Guyanese – more than 50 per cent of the total workforce. This number will continue to grow as additional operations progress.
ExxonMobil and its direct contractors have spent approximately $180 million with more than 630 local suppliers since the first discovery in 2015, the operator said.
The current estimated discovered recoverable resource for the Stabroek Block is more than 6 billion oil-equivalent barrels.
Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Limited –a subsidiary of ExxonMobil –is the operator and holds 45 per cent interest. Hess Guyana Exploration Ltd. holds 30 per cent interest and CNOOC Nexen Petroleum Guyana Limited holds 25 per cent interest.
