Feasibility study for offshore oil field, Sakhalin Island

Abstract

Russian Federation possesses an enormous volume of hydrocarbons. A significant part of the hydrocarbons is located in offshore areas, mostly in arctic and sub-arctic regions, where field development is relatively complicated and expensive in comparison with traditional onshore projects. The economic need of such projects is dictated by the fact, that in the nearest future the Russian domestic petroleum industry will face the problem of the conventional deposits’ depletion. That is why there is a need to develop unconventional and offshore projects. The Sakhalin Shelf, and especially Sakhalin-5 project, is believed to be the most perspective in the near-term. The Sakhalin-5 project is located in the north-eastern part of the Sakhalin Shelf and belongs to the sub-arctic region. Harsh meteorological and ice conditions have a great impact on field development. The Kaigansko-Vasyukankoe-more field; the Sakhalin-5 project, and more specifically the Pela Lache deposit, is selected as the reservoir of interest because it is considered to be the main one for the Kaigansko-Vasyukankoe-more field. The objective of the current master’s thesis is to identify and analyze the main meteorological and oceanographic conditions, their impact on the offshore field development and propose a development concept with minimal ecological risks. Due to the fact, that the field is on the early stage of design development, there is a great lack of data regarding the main properties and characteristics. For estimation of field production trends, there is a need to implement the analogue method and identify such deposit, which allows one to conduct such kind of calculations. After that, based on the analyzed results, to propose the most effective potential field layout and estimate its cost. Also, it is necessary to identify the optimal solution for transportation of the produced oil. In order to approve or disprove the feasibility of such a project, it is necessary to analyze the economic efficiency and ecological safety.