ONGC commissions first oil well under East Coast project

Dharmendra Pradhan, Minister of Petroleum & Natural Gas (MoPNG) and Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, today flagged off ONGC’s east coast project called KG-DWN-98/2 by spudding its first well called ‘#KDG-A.’

The well was spudded by the minister from the drillship, Platinum Explorer, around 35km off the Andhra Pradesh coast in the Bay of Bengal. #KDG-A is one of the 34 wells planned under this mega project.

With a target depth of 2,346 metres, under a water depth of 518 metres, the well is expected to produce around 5,000 barrels of oil per day (bopd) when put to production. The minister was accompanied by joint secretary Amar Nath, director MoPNG, Satyajit Mohanti, ONGC CMD Shashi Shanker and ONGC director Offshore Rajesh Kakkar.

Dharmendra Pradhan, Amar Nath, Satyajit Mohanti, Shashi Shanker, Rajesh Kakkar and ONGC staff on board the 'Platinum Explorer'.

According to ONGC, the east coast project is going to be a major contributor towards reducing India's hydrocarbon import dependence by 10 percent by 2022. The project would cumulatively produce 25 MMT (million metric tons) of oil and 45 BCM (billion cubic metres) of gas with peak production of 78,000 barrels per day of oil and 15 MMSCMD (million metric standard cubic metres per day) of gas. ONGC expects to bring first gas from this project to market by 2019 end and oil by 2020.

Auspicious traditional beginning

The project KG DWN 98/2 involves some of the most advanced oilfield technologies in drilling for the completion of 34 subsea wells, for laying about 425km of pipeline and for the 150km of the control umbilical in water depths varying from 300 to 1400 metres.

Of these 34 wells, 15 are oil producing, 8 are gas producing and 11 are water-injecting wells. There will be an offshore process platform for processing & evacuation of 6.5 MMSCMD of gas. The balance 5.75 MMSCMD gas will be transported through ONGC’s existing sub-sea infrastructure and facilities created at the onshore terminal of Odalarevu in Andhra coast. A Floating Production, Storage and Offloading Vessel (FPSO) will also be deployed in water at a depth of 413 metres to process the oil and gas.

Platinum Explorer is a sixth-generation drillship capable of working in water depths of 10,000 feet and drilling 40,000 feet.

After successful commissioning of its first deepwater project, S1 Vasishta in eastern offshore in March 2018 (which would be yielding about 4.3 MMSCMD of gas), ONGC’s flagship project from NELP block KG-DWN-98/2 in the deepwater of eastern offshore is now being readied for development.

The project 98/2 would start yielding oil and gas from 2019 end. Associated natural gas from cluster 2A of this project will have a peak production of 3 MMSCMD of gas and 78,000 bopd of oil with a 15-year profile; non-associated natural gas from cluster 2B will have a peak free gas production of 12.25 MMSCMD with a 16-year profile.

The project envisages capex of $ 5.07 billion and OPEX of $ 5.12 billion over a field life of 16 years.