OilVoice - Optimus Assists Melrose with Egyptian and Romanian Developments

Optimus Assists Melrose with Egyptian and Romanian Developments

Tuesday, April 06, 2010

Optimus announces its involvement in the successful Phase II development of the West Dikirnis field in the Mansoura concession in the Nile Delta and the successful completion of a FEED study for Melrose Resources Ana & Doina Development in the Romanian Sector of the Black Sea.

Optimus worked with Melrose Resources (a joint venture partner in Mansoura Petroleum) to prepare the development plan for West Dikirnis Phase II development which consisted of the addition of an LPG train to increase the recovery of LPG liquids and additional crude oil from the field. The project included the installation of a 5MW turbine driven gas injection compressor delivering gas at 3000 psi to maintain reservoir pressure and increase oil recovery. The compression train was designed and commissioned by Optimus.

Optimus designed, built, procured and commissioned the LPG train, which came on stream in the autumn of 2009, where in addition to recovering LPG it has enhanced oil recovery by 8% and removed the need to flare, significantly reducing greenhouse gas emissions, improving environmental performance and making use of 100% of the production.

Optimus was involved in providing 32.5% of the Capital Plant for the LPG train with all the piping and equipment items, including the fractionation columns and reboilers, specified by the process engineering team in Aberdeen and the mechanical, electrical and control design work carried out by Optimus Engineering in Varna, Bulgaria. The vessels were fabricated to ASME design codes by local contractors in Bulgaria and they were assembled into process equipment modules by Optimus in Varna. The equipment modules and 36 pipe modules were then shipped to Egypt.

When they arrived in the Nile Delta, the modules were hooked up under Optimus supervision and tied into a new plant control system. The control system was built locally with IT support from Optimus Engineering in Varna right from design to commissioning and operations.

In total Optimus had a team of 10 engineers employed on the project in Aberdeen and 30 engineers and technicians in Varna.

While the commissioning team were concluding work on the facilities in the Nile Delta, engineers back in Aberdeen were completing a FEED study for the Ana & Doina Field Development. Ana & Doina are gas reservoirs located in the Romanian Sector of the Black Sea, some 110km North East of the port of Constanta. The FEED study considered the development of the two offshore platforms, jacket & topsides, the 110 km 20' sealine; 25 km 20' landline and the onshore processing facility. This study is being considered by Melrose and its partners before the start of more detailed engineering.

Ian Bell, the director with responsibility for the project within Optimus said:
'This was the biggest project that Optimus has been involved in to date and we delivered a world class processing facility to Mansoura Petroleum that has the capability to increase liquids production at West Dikirnis both in terms of LPG product and additional crude recovery. I am proud of our achievements and our teams in Aberdeen and Varna who have worked as a single unit to deliver this project. The total engineering and project management charge to the client for this work was less than 10% of the total capital spend, this compares very favourably with the norm of up to 25% for other projects managed from Aberdeen.

The new FEED study for Ana & Doina has been an exciting development, spreading our geographic reach to Romania, and allowing us to showcase our jacket design capabilities in addition to the process and facilities capabilities we are known for.'