Brazil's Giant Libra Field Comes On Stream

First oil has been announced from the Libra mega-field, located in ultra-deep waters 180 kilometers offshore Rio de Janeiro, in the pre-salt Santos Basin in Brazil. 

The field is the first subsalt reservoir sold under Brazil's production-sharing regime. Its reservoir lies at a water depth of approximately 3,500 meters (11,500 feet) below sea level and has recoverable volumes estimated by oil regulator ANP at between eight billion and 12 billion barrels. 

Teekay Offshore and Brazil's Odebrecht Oil & Gas provided the FPSO Pioneiro de Libra which set sail on March 28 from the Jurong shipyard in Singapore, where the conversion of the unit from a tanker had been taking place since 2014. The FPSO has a capacity of 50,000 barrels of oil. 

Beyond this early production phase, the Libra development will further continue with the next investment decision for the Libra 1 FPSO with a capacity of 150,000 barrels per day, says Total. In the years ahead, other production units of similar capacity will be invested in so that the field can be developed to its full potential. 
 
The Libra field is operated by Petrobras (40 percent) as part of the international consortium whose other partners are Total (20 percent), Shell (20 percent), CNOOC (10 percent) and CNPC (10 percent).

Total Exploration & Production’s portfolio of assets currently includes 15 exploration blocks, located in the Barreirinhas, Ceará, Espirito Santo, Foz do Amazonas and Pelotas basins. In February 2017, Total and Petrobras signed agreements covering a number of upstream and downstream assets in Brazil, cementing the Strategic Alliance announced in December 2016. Under that deal, Total will hold a 22.5 percent stake in the Iara concession area in Block BM-S-11 and a 35 percent stake in and operatorship of Block BM-S-9 in the Lapa field concession, which came on stream in December 2016. 

Additionally, technical cooperation between the two companies will be strengthened, particularly through joint appraisal of the exploration potential in promising areas in Brazil and through the development of new technologies, particularly in the deep offshore. The transaction is subject to approvals by the relevant regulatory entities.