Unocal hopes to complete deepwater finding POD in a year

US oil company Unocal Corp. is expecting to be able to complete plans of development for its huge condensate and gas finding in Ranggas field which is located within Rapak production sharing contract (PSC) area in the deep water of Makassar Strait, a company executive said Tuesday.

?We are still in the process of appraising the finding, therefore we do not yet have firm, development plan over the findings. But we are hoping to come up with firm development plant in a year,? said Unocal Indonesia president Brian Marcotte.

Marcotte said the company had to carefully study the economics and the feasibility of the project since it was located at the depth of 6,000 feet below the sea.

?But we are optimistic that this project is feasible to be carried on,? he said.

Unocal currently estimated the gross discovery volume for the main Ranggas structure is about 200 to 350 million equivalent barrels of oil, with additional potential in other prospects on the same trend.

Earlier, Unocal had estimated the unrisked exploration potential of the entire Ranggas complex at 350 to 650 million equivalent barrels of oil. Unocal has now drilled six wells in the Ranggas complex, and all have discovered hydrocarbon potential.

Meanwhile Marcotte also stated that West Seno deep sea oil project which is also located in Makassar Strait is going on schedule and the first oil will be flowed April 2003, with production capacity of 20,000 BOPD, ramping up to 60,000 BOPD after the completion of second phase construction end of 2004. West Seno is the first Indonesian deep-water oil project. (alex)