Themed “The Legacy Continues with INSTEP, Enriching Subsea Knowledge”, 9 July 2019 marked a major milestone for Institut Teknologi Petroleum PETRONAS (INSTEP) and PC Mauritania 1 Pty Ltd (PCMPL) as the former received the ‘Subsea Christmas Tree’ from the latter, witnessed by honourable guests En Idris Ibrahim, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) from PETRONAS Technical Training Sdn Bhd; En Ahmad Lutpi Haron, International Production Expert from International Assets; En Wan M Marzuki Wan Ismail, Head of Infrastructure Engineering from Group Technical Solutions (GTS); and En Izrie Ghazali, Project Manager from Group Project Delivery (GPD).
For those of you wondering, the ‘Subsea Christmas Tree’ is a system of valves, piping, and connectors used to direct, control, and regulate the flow of oil, gas or water into or out of the well.
Deepwater capability development journey for PETRONAS begins with the acquisition of Chinguetti Field in Mauritania, West Africa, with PCMPL as the Field Operator. The interest of the field including three offshore exploration blocks, was acquired from Woodside Energy Limited (WEL) on 25 December 2007. Discovered in 2001, the Chinguetti field is located in Deep Water Block 4, about 80 km west of the coastline and about 90 km from the Mauritanian capital, Nouakchott.
PETRONAS’ objective is to establish the foundation and eventually develop and enhance internal deepwater capability by operating the Chinguetti field. According to En Lutpi, “Operations in Chinguetti Field is a reflection of PETRONAS’ extensive journey in deepwater. Although the field has stopped producing, the experience continues through learning, producing talents through INSTEP for deepwater ventures in Mexico and Africa.”
The Chinguetti operations has served as the “breeding ground” for the young but enthusiastic engineers to acquire, develop and enhance their skills in deepwater environment. With experience in operating Chinguetti field, integrated capability is available across OPUs/HCUs, offering end to end solution in the five key focus areas i.e. Exploration, Development, Operation, Decommissioning and R&D. Deepwater best practices and lessons learnt implementation drives project value improvement derived from the experience operating Chinguetti field.
As part of normal field life cycle, it is concluded that the field’s journey has come to an end, ready to be abandoned and decommissioned. This has opened up an opportunity for International Asset (IA) to collaborate with Project Delivery & Technology (PD&T) Division , who has been entrusted to execute the Chinguetti Abandonment & Decommissioning (A&D), the first deepwater A&D project for PETRONAS.
The Chinguetti A&D execution is divided into two phases. Phase 1: Temporary Well Suspension and FPSO Decommissioning & Demobilisation, Phase 2: Wells Plug & Abandonment. Phase 1 commenced in 2017 and successfully completed in May 2018. Meanwhile, Phase 2 campaign will commence in Q4 this year, encompassing Wells Plug & Abandonment (P&A) of 15 temporary suspended wells.
In line with A&D programme, PD&T and IA have taken the effort to enhance value proposition of the ‘Subsea Christmas Tree’ by donating it to INSTEP. “INSTEP is honoured to receive such a meaningful contribution and we are geared towards sweating the asset to add value to subsea training, supporting PETRONAS’ agenda in international growth”, says En Idris.
As a recipient of this asset, INSTEP sees the ‘Subsea Christmas Tree’ as more than just an asset, but a perfect avenue to add value to their training programmes. En Wan M Marzuki says that it is undoubtedly PETRONAS’ focus to drive subsea solutions towards deepwater, shallow water, and marginal field. Through collaboration with INSTEP, we will be able to produce new portfolios for subsea training and development, and build up SKG training.
The ‘Subsea Christmas Tree’ will complement INSTEP’s experiential learning for 8 out of 17 existing SKG 12.5 programmes, for example, Introduction to Subsea Engineering Level 1, Intervention of Subsea Equipment Level 2 and Subsea Christmas Tree & Wellhead Level 2. Additional one new programme will be envisioned and readily made available by Q4 2019 with a widened target audience, not limited to only SKGs, but also to educate on the awareness of subsea operations, enhancing subsea capability.
“The Subsea Christmas Tree is now accessible to the mass of PETRONAS and this prepares the organisation to soar to a greater height in continuing subsea deepwater journey”, says En Izrie Ghazali. This effort will subsequently allow INSTEP, in collaboration with GTS, to give real life experience and exposure to subsea technology for the relevant PETRONAS staff and enhance their subsea capability.
Themed “The Legacy Continues with INSTEP, Enriching Subsea Knowledge”, 9 July 2019 marked a major milestone for Institut Teknologi Petroleum PETRONAS (INSTEP) and PC Mauritania 1 Pty Ltd (PCMPL) as the former received the ‘Subsea Christmas Tree’ from the latter, witnessed by honourable guests En Idris Ibrahim, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) from PETRONAS Technical Training Sdn Bhd; En Ahmad Lutpi Haron, International Production Expert from International Assets; En Wan M Marzuki Wan Ismail, Head of Infrastructure Engineering from Group Technical Solutions (GTS); and En Izrie Ghazali, Project Manager from Group Project Delivery (GPD).
For those of you wondering, the ‘Subsea Christmas Tree’ is a system of valves, piping, and connectors used to direct, control, and regulate the flow of oil, gas or water into or out of the well.
Deepwater capability development journey for PETRONAS begins with the acquisition of Chinguetti Field in Mauritania, West Africa, with PCMPL as the Field Operator. The interest of the field including three offshore exploration blocks, was acquired from Woodside Energy Limited (WEL) on 25 December 2007. Discovered in 2001, the Chinguetti field is located in Deep Water Block 4, about 80 km west of the coastline and about 90 km from the Mauritanian capital, Nouakchott.
PETRONAS’ objective is to establish the foundation and eventually develop and enhance internal deepwater capability by operating the Chinguetti field. According to En Lutpi, “Operations in Chinguetti Field is a reflection of PETRONAS’ extensive journey in deepwater. Although the field has stopped producing, the experience continues through learning, producing talents through INSTEP for deepwater ventures in Mexico and Africa.”
The Chinguetti operations has served as the “breeding ground” for the young but enthusiastic engineers to acquire, develop and enhance their skills in deepwater environment. With experience in operating Chinguetti field, integrated capability is available across OPUs/HCUs, offering end to end solution in the five key focus areas i.e. Exploration, Development, Operation, Decommissioning and R&D. Deepwater best practices and lessons learnt implementation drives project value improvement derived from the experience operating Chinguetti field.
As part of normal field life cycle, it is concluded that the field’s journey has come to an end, ready to be abandoned and decommissioned. This has opened up an opportunity for International Asset (IA) to collaborate with Project Delivery & Technology (PD&T) Division , who has been entrusted to execute the Chinguetti Abandonment & Decommissioning (A&D), the first deepwater A&D project for PETRONAS.
The Chinguetti A&D execution is divided into two phases. Phase 1: Temporary Well Suspension and FPSO Decommissioning & Demobilisation, Phase 2: Wells Plug & Abandonment. Phase 1 commenced in 2017 and successfully completed in May 2018. Meanwhile, Phase 2 campaign will commence in Q4 this year, encompassing Wells Plug & Abandonment (P&A) of 15 temporary suspended wells.
In line with A&D programme, PD&T and IA have taken the effort to enhance value proposition of the ‘Subsea Christmas Tree’ by donating it to INSTEP. “INSTEP is honoured to receive such a meaningful contribution and we are geared towards sweating the asset to add value to subsea training, supporting PETRONAS’ agenda in international growth”, says En Idris.
As a recipient of this asset, INSTEP sees the ‘Subsea Christmas Tree’ as more than just an asset, but a perfect avenue to add value to their training programmes. En Wan M Marzuki says that it is undoubtedly PETRONAS’ focus to drive subsea solutions towards deepwater, shallow water, and marginal field. Through collaboration with INSTEP, we will be able to produce new portfolios for subsea training and development, and build up SKG training.
The ‘Subsea Christmas Tree’ will complement INSTEP’s experiential learning for 8 out of 17 existing SKG 12.5 programmes, for example, Introduction to Subsea Engineering Level 1, Intervention of Subsea Equipment Level 2 and Subsea Christmas Tree & Wellhead Level 2. Additional one new programme will be envisioned and readily made available by Q4 2019 with a widened target audience, not limited to only SKGs, but also to educate on the awareness of subsea operations, enhancing subsea capability.
“The Subsea Christmas Tree is now accessible to the mass of PETRONAS and this prepares the organisation to soar to a greater height in continuing subsea deepwater journey”, says En Izrie Ghazali. This effort will subsequently allow INSTEP, in collaboration with GTS, to give real life experience and exposure to subsea technology for the relevant PETRONAS staff and enhance their subsea capability.
