India’s state owned Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) is pumping in nearly US$4 billion worth of technological upgrades into its flagship yet ageing Mumbai High oil and gas fields.
Pumping oil from the field with its complex and irregular rock formations has been a challenge since its discovery in 1974. With production peaking at 400,000 bpd, output has sagged over 32 years to nearly half as the field matured.
To counter this, ONGC has deployed several smart technologies that keep costs down by reducing the number of platforms or mid-sea structures for producing oil from the hard-to-reach reservoir rock left behind due to uneven movement of encroaching water in the reservoir.
One of the key innovations, a first for India, is introduction of a rig mounted platform having 16 slots for the drilling of upto 16 wells in 80-metre water depths. The platform accommodates the drilling rig on board which is designed to handle with the challenges posed by Mumbai High at places where the seabed is not hard enough to support jack-up rig pillars.
The innovations and inputs in the ongoing second phase of redevelopment are expected to add over 37 million tonnes of oil. The latest phase of the redevelopment plan is expected to be completed in 2012.
Deployment of new mulilateral drilling methods has also helped drill horizontal wells more than 3,000 metres away from the platform, saving money on the number of platforms required.
