Successful Implementation of Low-Pressure Operations LPO Projects: Delivering Low UTC Incremental Oil in Low Oil Price Market

Southern Oman has several high pressure (500-1000 bar), deep (3-5 km) and critically sour oil fields (H2S/CO2 up to ~10%/25%). Most of these reservoirs are carbonate stringers encapsulated in salt lacking any natural aquifer support. Field Development strategy for most of the reservoirs in the cluster is primary depletion followed by miscible gas injection. No artificial lift mechanism is installed in these fields, as gas flood is expected to provide the necessary energy later. Many of these fields are depleted and reached lift-die out conditions due to high backpressure from the station. To extend the depletion production life, the team came with Low-Pressure Operation (LPO) project for these fields. This concept was successfully implemented in various fields across the 3 production stations in the cluster. LPO concept is a novel, pragmatic and cost-effective solution to continue production from previous lift die-out wells which is first of its kind in the company. This approach helped to utilize the existing infrastructure and ullage available in the facilities and eliminate the need for installing expensive and complex artificial lifts (e.g. ESP) or depletion compressor systems. This resulted in incremental production at very low UTC and low CAPEX requirements during the low oil price period.