Introduction
As promised last week, today’s column starts my review of Rystad Energy’s widely circulated results obtained from its modelling of the cost of delay for the Payara project. This project is based on the January 2017 crude oil discovery by ExxonMobil and its partners in the Stabroek Block. As reported, this is a high quality oil-bearing reservoir encountering more than 29 meters of oil bearing sandstone, drilled to 5,512 meters in 2030 meters of water. Based on ExxonMobil’s announcement, the Payara project will constitute the third producing reservoir; operating from a floating offshore production, storage and offloading vessel (FPSO). Crude oil production at Payara is targeted at 220,000 barrels of oil per day, at full ramp up, utilizing 45 supporting wells, including for production, water injection and gas injection.