Rosneft discovers oil in Kara Sea
Rosneft successfully completed the drilling of the Universitetskaya-1 well in the Arctic – the northernmost well in the world, according to the company, and discovered oil at the East-Prinovozemelskiy-1 license area. The drilling was completed in record time – in 1.5 months – in compliance with all the technological and ecological standards and requirements.
The sea depth at the drilling site is 81 m, and the depth of the straight well is 2,113 m. The well was drilled 250 km offshore Russia.
As a result of the drilling formation, samples were obtained, a pilot borehole was drilled (8.5-in. diameter to a depth of 600 m), and horizontal drill samples were collected. Geological data interpretation is being conducted, and the field’s development model is being elaborated. The security and fail-safety of the operations of future drilling is guaranteed by the landing of five columns.
“I can inform you about the discovery of the first oil/gas-condensate field in the new Kara Sea oil province. The first oil was extracted. It is an astonishing sample of light oil, which based on the results of the analysis performed, is comparable to the Siberian light oil,” said Igor Sechin, Head of Rosneft. “The resource base estimate of just this oil trap is 338 billion cu m of gas and more than 100 million tons of oil. And this is just the estimate of this very structure. This is an outstanding result of the first exploratory drilling on a completely new offshore field.”
Rosneft worked with ExxonMobil, North Atlantic Drilling, Schlumberger, Halliburton, Weatherford, Baker Hughes, Trendsetter and FMC Technologies. The field has been named Pobeda, which means victory in Russian.
A wide range of detailed researches of the environment preceded geological operations: climate, iceberg migration and wildlife analyses were conducted. Rosneft has conducted such research in the Kara Sea, Laptev and Chukchee Sea. All of this data is taken into consideration while planning the exploration and design of the rigs for the evaluation of logistics for shelf projects.
