BP and the Azerbaijani state oil company SOCAR are discussing the plans on oil production at the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli (ACG) block of oil and gas fields for 2017, Bakhtiyar Aslanbayli, BP vice president for communications, external affairs, strategy and region, reported.
The annual production plan has not been approved yet and it is difficult to talk about specific figures, he said.
“BP and SOCAR are now discussing the budget and a work plan for the next year”, Aslanbayli added.
Tendency to reduce production at the ACG block is due to aging and water invasion of the wells, and the output from the wells that are to be drilled will not be too large, he said.
This is why it will be difficult to maintain oil production at the 2015 and 2016 levels, Aslanbayli explained.
Aslanbayli went on to add that additional investments are required to stabilize production at the ACG.
“New investments will be attracted here to maintain production at a certain level in accordance with resolving the issues on extension of the contract for ACG development”, he said.
BP Azerbaijan is the operator in development of the ACG block. A contract for development of the ACG block of fields was signed in 1994. The proven oil reserve of the block nears 1 billion tons.
Shareholders of the project are BP (35.78%), Chevron (11.27%), Inpex (10.96%), AzACG (11.65%), Statoil (8.55%), Exxon (8%), TPAO (6.75%), Itochu (4.3%) and ONGC (2.72%). (Trend/Business World Magazine)