Installation of Peregrino Topside Completed

January 17, 2020 | Oil & Gas | Energy Facts Staff Writer | 4min

Equinor announced the completion of the Peregrino topside in Brazil. Over the last few weeks it has been installed by heavy lift vessel Sleipnir. The floatel GranEnergia Olympia has connected to the platform and in total 880 individuals will work offshore to prepare the platform for operations.

The Peregrino field
The Peregrino field – in the Campos Basin – is Equinor’s largest operated international offshore operation. Located 85 kilometres off the coast of Rio de Janeiro in water depths around 100m, the field contains an estimated reserve of 400 million barrels of recoverable oil.

With more than 160 million barrels produced since 2011, the field currently produces around 70,000-80,000 barrels of oil a day. Over the last four years Equinor has managed to reduce their cost base by 35 per cent, which will help them maximize value creation on the long run and improve on cash flow.

Peregrino includes two fixed platforms (WHP-A and WHP-B) and a Floating Production Storage and Offloading unit (FPSO Peregrino) with capacity for producing 100kbpoed. The platforms are connected to the FPSO via flow lines and electrical umbilicals. Equinor has completed 39 production wells and seven water injector wells between both platforms, and they have managed to increase the recovery rate from 10% to 16% and has ambitions to improve even more.

In January 2018 Equinor began testing polymer injection through one well, tracking the results through sensors. Polymer flooding involves adding polymers to water injection, decreasing the water-oil mobility ratio in the reservoir, prolonging the oil production plateau and increased reserves. The project is one of the key measures for realizing Equinor’s ambitions to create higher value from the Peregrino field.

Phase II
Peregrino’s phase II involved the addition of a third fixed wellhead platform to the field, which will be able to drill wells to reach reservoirs which are inaccessible through the current platforms A and B. This will extend its main productive life and add 273 million in recoverable reserves.

The third platform (WHP-C) is installed in the Peregrino field, leading up to first oil end of 2020. The new drilling platform will increase the number of production wells in a new area (Southwest Peregrino), which is currently not reachable by the existing platforms.

In the Peregrino phase II, Equinor intents to apply the experience acquired in the first phase of the Peregrino development, adopting simplification and standardization to secure project robustness. In the operation phase, most of the services and products procured will be local.