Eni to begin production phase of East Hub Angola project

Rome - Five months in advance from the development plan schedule and with an excellent time-to-market, Eni has started the production of their East Hub Development Project. The site of the project is in Block 15/06 in Angola's deep offshore waters. A communique released by Eni announced that the production is to take place via the Armada Olombendo floating production storage and offloading (Fpso) vessel, a ship that can produce up to 80,000 crude oil barrels a day and stock up to 3.4 million cubic metres of gas a day. With its 9 underwater wells and 4 manifolds placed at a depth of 450 meteres, Fpso Olombendo will start producing at the Cabaca South East oil field, 350 kilometres northwest of Luanda and 130 kilometres west of Soyo. The East Hub Project production adds on to that of the West Hub Project where another Fpso, the N'Goma, has already connected the fields of Sangos, Cinguvu, Mpungi and Mpungi North. Block 15/06 is expected to reach a peak of 150,000 barrels of oil per day this year. "We are proud of what we have achieved in Block 15/06," said Eni's CEO, Claudio Descalzi. "Leveraging our extensive experience in exploration, we have been able to discover a total of 3 billion barrels of oil in place through 10 commercial discoveries. Moreover, thanks to strong field development and project management, we are beginning production of the East Hub with a time-to-market of only 3 years, and 5 months ahead of schedule. Cabaca South East brings our number of fields in production to 5, with 2 more expected to start before the end of 2018. This is yet another example of Eni's Angolan and worldwide capability to deliver state-of-the-art projects, and was made possible by Eni's new operational model, where we play an increasingly active role in the integrated development of our projects." Block 15/06 is operated by Eni with a 36.84 percent share, while Sonangol Pesquisa e Producao holds 36.84 percent and SSI Fifteen Limited controls 26.32 percent. Eni has been present in Angola since 1980 by means of its subsidiary company, Eni Angola. The equity production in 2016 amounted to 124,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day.