Total plans four new wells in Lapa field, offshore Brazil

HOUSTON -- The objective of the French oil company is to expand the production of the field in the pre-salt of the Santos Basin.

Scheduled this year, Lapa's new development campaign in the Santos Basin pre-salt will include drilling four wells in the field, Total told BE Petróleo. According to the company, the works will allow to increase the production of the asset with security.

Campo de Lapa now produces approximately 24,000 bopd from two producing wells connected to the FPSO Cidade de Caraguatatuba. The volume is 40% lower than the one extracted in January 2018, when Total took over the field operation, after negotiating with Petrobras.

Last week, the French oil company completed an intervention campaign in one of the LPA-1D's Lapa wells. Initiated in February, the works consisted in buffering the well, isolating the surface reservoir, and installing underwater equipment (manifold and treecap).

As reported by BE Petróleo, the LPA-1D had a slope above the seabed due to the decoupling of the low and high pressure housings. Although the slope did not compromise safety barriers, the oil company decided to stop the production of the well before abandoning it permanently.

"Total worked with the competent authorities and its partners in the Lapa consortium to carry out this intervention in a successful way," the company said.

As a preventive measure, the ANP had authorized the shutdown of the injector wells in order to avoid increase of pressure in the well during the intervention. According to the agency, these wells have already started to operate again.

The LPA-1D will be one of two wells that Total will abandon in Lapa. The oil company's plan is to abandon the former - which already had a useful life expected to end this year, according to studies of corrosion prepared by Petrobras (former operator of the asset) - in September.

The Lapa consortium comprises Total (35%), Shell (30%), Repsol-Sinopec (25%) and Petrobras (10%).