Oil began flowing on 7 August from the Kizomba A development in block 15 off Angola, where Statoil has a 13.33 per cent interest.
“Our international production is set to expand sharply in future,” comments Ottar Rekdal, acting executive vice president of the group’s International Exploration & Production business area.
“Bringing Kizomba A on stream marks an important step in this direction.”
He adds that the start-up of this development also underlines Angola’s central place in Statoil’s international portfolio. The group already has production in the Girassol field in block 17 and an oil discovery has been made in block 31. Statoil has a 13.33 per cent interest on each of these blocks.
According to operator ExxonMobil, the deepwater Kizomba A project contains an estimated one billion barrels of recoverable oil.
The target is to produce 250,000 barrels per day at plateau, and Statoil’s share of this will amount to just over 33,000 barrels.
Located in the north-western corner of block 15, the Kizomba A development is about 370 kilometres north-west of the Angolan capital of Luanda.
It secures production from the Hungo and Chocalho discoveries, which both lie in 1,180 metres of water.
The project embraces a tension leg platform (TLP) tied to one of the world’s largest floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessels, which can store 2.2 million barrels.
Kizomba A is the second of three developments in block 15. Xikomba came on stream last November, while Kizomba B is due to come on stream in early 2006.
Apart from Statoil, ExxonMobil has 40 per cent of block 15, BP has 26.67 per cent and ENI has 20 per cent.