By Jeremy Beckman, Offshore's London-based editor
LONDON — Serica Energy has reserved rig clots next year to drill infill wells on the Bittern, Gannet E, Guillemot North West and Evelyn fields in the UK central North Sea in 2024.
All the fields are tied back to the Triton FPSO. The company took on these interests following its acquisition of previous operator Tailwind Energy.
Serica is also progressing development of the Belinda Field as an additional tieback to the FPSO and aims to submit the development plan later this year and achieve project sanction in 2024.
And the company is assessing a redevelopment of the Mansell Field in UK northern North Sea Block 3/8g, south and east of the Ninian and Columba fields. bp discovered Mansell in 1985 the field (then named Staffa) was later tied back to the Chevron-operated Ninian South Platform and produced between 1992 and 1995.
It was shut in during 1995 following waxing-up of the flowline and decommissioned, but it has remaining contingent resources of up to 16 MMboe. Studies are underway to determine the feasibility and timing of a redevelopment.
In the Parkmead-operated P2400 license in central North Sea, 60 km south of the Erskine Field, there is a commitment to drill a well to a depth of 3,500 m or 200 m into the Chalk Group, whichever is shallower.
Parkmead has proposed a vertical well targeting the Mey reservoir and a deeper Tor chalk reservoir, with Exceed responsible for well planning. The well should spud in late 2024, with a site survey likely early next year.
At the Bruce Field complex, Serica has completed the replacement and upgrade of the control system for the Bruce platform in the northern North Sea this year, increasing the amount of data that can be captured and processed. This should open the way to AI-based improvements to control, monitoring and maintenance activities.
In addition, the company replaced the subsea control modules on the WAD manifold to support light well intervention (LWI) activity in third-quarter 2023 and first-quarter 2024.
Major works took place during the summer outage to replace the main platform flare tip, 140 m above the sea surface and requiring a heli-lift, along with overhauls of the glycol system and a booster compressor. These should help to extend Bruce production to 2035 or beyond.
The three-well LWI program for 2023 started this month and should also boost production volumes. Work on the Bruce M3 and M6 wells includes scale removal, a reperforation and a new perforation.
09.19.2023
