Production at the Galoc oil field as of end-December last year may have reached 8.46 million barrels, depleting about 68 percent of the estimated 12.4 million barrels in reserves within Service Contract 14C.
According to Australian firm Nido Petroleum Ltd., crude production in the last quarter of 2011 stood at 317,972 barrels, allowing the joint venture to ship two cargos during the period.
This adds to the production as of September last year of 8.14 million barrels.
During the fourth quarter of 2011 alone, the SC 14C joint venture managed to ship to its customers a combined volume of 702,256 barrels of oil.
These shipments brought to 25 the total number of shipments made by the joint venture since the Galoc field began producing oil in October 2008.
Production at the Galoc oil field is currently suspended as the floating production storage and offtake facility is undergoing a three-month facility upgrade.
Meanwhile, Nido Petroleum disclosed that it is currently negotiating a project financing facility, which is expected to cover around 60 percent of the company’s share of the development costs in the planned Phase 2 development of the Galoc oil field.
Nido further reported that Galoc Production Co., the operator of the field, is progressing work on the Front End Engineering and Design (FEED) work, which will determine the exact locations and number of additional wells to be drilled for Phase II.
Under the initial Galoc Phase II development options, the joint venture targets to increase reserves by 5 million barrels of oil by drilling as many as three new wells, which were estimated to yield about 4,000 barrels of oil per day.
These wells may be drilled in the northern portion of the Galoc structure to boost production and access undeveloped reserves. Drilling is expected to take place by 2013.