West Africa

This paper is designed to outline well intervention and P&A opportunities available to contractors in the West Coast of Africa by analysing regional levels of activity, operator well stock and major projects (part 2).

Production decline in mature fields is a common challenge to offshore operators throughout the globe. And in West Africa especially, where developing new fields often requires delving into unexplored deepwater and ultra- deepwater territories, many have decided to take advantage of innovative technical developments in enhanced oil recovery technologies to recover the maximum from their existing oil reserves.

Sonangol EP is one of those companies who, despite recent positive discoveries in its offshore pre-salt acreage which should comfortably allow Angola to maintain its status as Africa’s second largest oil producer, sees the need to ensure additional reserves are extracted from existing wells. Today, we speak with Geraldo Ramos, Senior Production Engineer at Sonangol EP who is currently undertaking a PhD at the University of Aberdeen focusing on Advanced Enhanced Oil Recovery techniques with specific focus on Angolan onshore/offshore fields. We discuss his results so far, his vision for Angola’s 2018 production landscape and the experience he gained from the North Sea.

Sonangol’s Geraldo Ramos shares a unique case study outlining the results of a new approach to EOR in West Africa.