Vallourec Soluçoes Tubulares do Brasil has been awarded a contract by TechnipFMC in Brazil to supply around 12,000 tons of seamless steel rigid line pipe.
The pipe will be used in the fabrication of the riser and flowline system for interconnecting 13 wells (6 production wells and 7 water alternate gas injection wells), to be installed in the pre-salt field Mero 1, which is part of the giant Libra reservoir.
Libra covers an area of 1,550 square kilometers, equivalent to the size of the Brazilian city of São Paulo, with recoverable reserves estimated in the range of 8 to 12 billion of barrels of oil.
The Libra Block has been developed under a consortium agreement with Petrobras (40% share) as operator, and with Shell (20%), Total (20%), CNOOC Limited (10%), CNPC (10%) and Pré-Sal Petróleo – PPSA (state owned company, manager of Libra Consortium contract) as the other consortium partners.
The Mero field is located around 180 kilometers off the Rio de Janeiro coast, in ultra-deep waters and has high quality carbonate reservoirs with expected high well productivity.
“ The award reflects the value of our integrated solution for rigid riser and flowline systems for ultra-deep water fields. This contract confirms that the strategy implemented by Vallourec to provide the clients with rigid line-pipe solutions is appropriate. We understand the market has reached an inflexion point where the demand for rigid risers will increase. At such depths and distance from the shore, rigid line pipe offers the most sustainable solution for the lifetime of such projects ,” said Alexandre Lyra , senior vice president South America, Vallourec.
Vallourec said the pipe supply will start at the end of 2019.