Shell has begun a planned shutdown of the Majnoon oil field in Iraq, taking 54,000 barrels per day of production off Iraq’s production slate.
The Anglo-Dutch supermajor, which operates Majnoon and holds a 45% stake in the contract to develop the field, has said that the shutdown is part of the normal maintenance of the field, according to a Reuters report. No date for a return to production has been given.
At a recent conference in London, Hans Nijkamp, head of Shell’s operations in Iraq, said that there are currently 2,200 staff and contractors at the site, 1,850 of whom are Iraqi. A 15-well drilling program is underway by Halliburton. Construction of a jetty on the Shatt al-Arab has been completed, which Nijkamp says reduces disruptive road cargoes.
Shell has also briefed on its mine and ordnance clearing operations at Majnoon, available to read here.
Shell, with junior partner Petronas of Malaysia, won the Majnoon contract by promising to boost the largely undeveloped field to 1.8 million bpd for a fee of $1.39 a barrel.
Majnoon holds 12.6 billion barrels of reserves. Shell is currently renegotiating the production plan with Iraq’s oil ministry, with a view to agreeing a lower but more sustainable production plateau target than the 1.8 million barrels originally agreed.
Iraq’s national production target of 12 million bpd by 2017 has proved too aggressive due to infrastructure bottlenecks and logistical shortcomings, and other field renegotiations may be coming.
