Project Profile
Location: P.111 Blocks 23/22a, 280km east of Aberdeen
Reserves: 100 million barrels of oil and 202 billion ft³ of gas
Production: 3.47 million barrels of oil and 28.49 billion cubic feet of gas (2010)
Water depth: 85 m
Discovery year: 1975
Start-up year: February 1999
Pierce lies in blocks 23/22a, 280km east of Aberdeen. The field comprises two accumulations: the first is Pierce North (formerly Medan) and the second is Pierce South (formerly Pierce). Prior to the field coming onstream, the estimated recoverable reserves were upgraded to 100 million barrels of oil and 202 billion ft³ of gas. This translates into a field production life of five to 13 years. Pierce is made up of cone-shaped salt diapir reservoirs.
Pierce was discovered in 1975, when the semisubmersible Sedneth 701, drilling for Ranger Oil, tested 3,000bpd of 40° API crude and 1.95 million ft³/d of gas from the Palaeocene sands reservoir with its well 23/27-3. In mid-1996, Ranger took the decision to carry out an extended well test using the rig JW McLean. This produced a total of 1.17million barrels of oil during the test at an average production rate of 15,000 bpd, although rates of up to 20,000 bpd were recorded. At this point, Pierce was declared commercially viable, with reserves standing at a rate of 40 million barrels of oil, excluding gas.
The field is tied into the Haewene Brim FPS0 vessel. Oil is exported directly to market via shuttle tankers. All produced gas, other than that consumed for fuel and flare on the FPSO, is currently re-injected into the reservoir.
Operators:
Shell: Operator with 92.52% interest
Ithaca Energy Inc.: 7.48% interest
Contractors:
BP: FEED contract (field operator until 1997)
Global Energy Group: Fabrication scope of work includes
- Installed pipework, valves and control tubing/equipment into the Pierce A11 / Gas Lift manifold.
- The Manifold was then transported to the Global Energy Group’s Invergordon Quayside Facility for a week’s site integration testing prior load out onto a vessel.
- The manifold weighs 90te, plus 4 No 610 diameter by 10.5 metre long piles that go out with the Manifiold.
- Fabricated 7 No 2”, 6” and 8” Gas Lift / Production Tie-in spools in super duplex and Alloy 625 materials which were coated with S.P.U. insulation coating (S.D.) and Durapol coating on the Alloy 625 spools.
Fjords Processing: A contract to provide environmental assessments. The environmental impact studies will focus on water discharges, ecotoxicology tests and computer modelling. (September, 2016)