Friday, July 1, 2011

Vietnam's Te Giac Trang field oil, gas output to jump in Aug 2012

Friday 1 July 2011

HANOI, July 1 (Reuters) - Crude oil and gas production is expected to start next August at a jacket of the Te Giac Trang field offshore Vietnam, which would nearly double the field output to 95,000 barrels per day (bpd), operators said.

Te Giac Trang (White Rhino) in block 16-1, operated by Hoang Long Joint Operating Co and where Soco International PLC owns 28.5 percent, will begin extracting around 55,000 bpd next month, Soco said in May.

On Wednesday Hoang Long JOC signed a $44 million deal with Petrovietnam Equipment Assembly & Metal Joint Stock Co, run by Petrovietnam's construction arm PVC , to build the topside of the H4 jacket, Petrovietnam statement released late on Thursday said.

Construction will run between July 4 and late May 2012 and H4 is slated to get its first flow of crude oil and gas around next August, the statement said.

Hoang Long is expected to add 40,000 bpd to its Te Giac Trang output from the H4 development by next August, Soco has said.

Te Giac Trang lies 100 km (62 miles) southeast of Vietnam's southern city of Vung Tau. Block 16-1 is also 41 percent owned by Petrovietnam, 28.5 percent by Thailand's PTT Exploration and Production PCL , and 2 percent owned by Soco's Opeco Inc.

Vietnam's crude oil production has been declining due to ageing fields, including the Bach Ho (White Tiger) main oilfield.

The country's overall crude oil output last month fell 2.8 percent from a year ago to 1.17 million tonnes, or 285,900 bpd, the government said.

Petrovietnam has projected Vietnam's crude oil production this year at 15 million tonnes, unchanged from 2010.

(Reporting by Ho Binh Minh)

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