West White Rose project on target for first oil in 2026, Cenovus reports
SeaRose FPSO life extension complete, and production to resume this month, investors told
Production in the White Rose oil field in offshore Newfoundland and Labrador will resume in the coming days, while an expensive satellite project called West White Rose is also on target for first oil in 2026.
Calgary-based Cenovus Energy gave those updates Thursday while releasing the company's latest financial results. The company is the operator and majority owner of the White Rose field and satellite extensions.
The overhaul for the SeaRose floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel is complete, the vessel is back on station 350 kilometres east of St. John's, and is reconnected to the White Rose field.
Production is scheduled to resume "by the end of February," according to a Cenovus news release.
The SeaRose FPSO began production on the Grand Banks two decades ago, and is one of four producing fields in the Jeanne d'Arc Basin.
The 271-metre long SeaRose ceased operations in early 2024 and travelled to the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast, Northern Ireland for the refit.
The FPSO produced more than 6.6 million barrels of crude in 2022, according to the offshore regulator, and was originally scheduled to resume production last summer.
Meanwhile, Cenovus reports that all mechanical work is now complete on the concrete gravity structure (CGS) and topsides for the West White Rose project.
The CGS, at 145 metres tall and weighing 200,000 tonnes, was constructed inside a unique graving dock at the Port of Argentia.
The topsides were build at a yard in Ingleside, Texas.
The plan is to flood the graving dock with 19 metres of seawater from Placentia Bay this spring or summer, float the CGS to its location in the White Rose oil field, and fix it to the seabed in roughly 120 metres of water. The topsides will simultaneously be floated from Texas, and mated with the structure.
"The focus of the project in 2025 will be on the installation and commissioning of the platform," the company said, adding that the project is now 88 per cent complete and "on schedule for first oil in 2026."
Daily production from the West White Rose is expected to reach 80,000 barrels of oil per day.
The new platform will be capable of drilling up to 40 wells in the White Rose oil field, but unlike other platforms such as Hibernia and Hebron, it will not refine or store the oil. Instead, it will send the oil back to the nearby SeaRose FPSO through a series of subsea flowlines.
The SeaRose life extension and the West White Rose extension is expected to extend the life of the oil field by 14 years.
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