At UAE, Exxon Plans to Develop The Massive Offshore Upper Zakum

Exxon Mobil Corporation plans to build four artificial islands in the Upper Zakum oil field off Abu Dhabi that could result in cost savings of several billion dollars. Home to a staggering 50 billion barrels of proven crude.

Beneath the  waters off the coast of Abu Dhabi lies one of the world's largest oilfield. About 50 miles northeast of the emirate's capital, an estimated 50 billion barrels of oil sit below the sea.

The Upper Zakum field is made up of layer upon layer of complex reservoir. On the water's surface, a handful of manmade island are taking shape.

The artificial islands would replace more than 100 conventional steel drilling towers around the super oilfield. ExxonMobil's lead country manager in Abu Dhabi, Morten Mauritzen said, multiple wells would be drilled, an "innovation" that ExxonMobil hopes will save billions of dollars during the six-year development as well as benefit the environment.

The cost savings would come over the 25 years remaining for commercial production at Upper Zakum, where Zakum Development Co. (Zadco) project  is pumping crude. State-run Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. (Adnoc), has a 60 percent stake in Zadco, with Exxon Mobil holding 28 percent and Japan Oil Development Co. (Jodco) owning the rest.

Zadco plans a $15 billion artificial islands project to boost production at the field by about 40 percent to 750,000 barrels a day, where building islands is cheaper than erecting offshore production platforms.

Upper Zakum project is part of an ongoing programme launched by Adnoc to expand its oil output capacity to around 3.5 million bpd within the next seven years from nearly 2.6 million bpd at present. The programme also covers development of the emirate’s gas fields, including the Shah sour gas venture.

The idea was to build four artificial islands and utilise ExxonMobil’s extended-reach drilling technology, which allows wells to be drilled vertically and horizontally to target reservoirs several miles away. Similar technology has been tried and tested in ExxonMobil’s concessions in Northeast Russia.

The plan to develop the massive offshore Upper Zakum is going ahead despite recent furore over the offshore oil production worldwide following the massive leakage in British Petroleum’s concession in the Gulf of Mexico.

The costs of offshore drilling are high, adding that investment in Upper Zakum expansion will be huge. ExxonMobil alone plans to spend several billions of dollars on the project.