PanAfrican Energy Tanzania (PAT) has today taken delivery of the most powerful land rig to currently operate in Tanzania. The arrival of the rig signals the start of PAT’s new US130 million investment programme to double gas production capacity at Songo Songo in order to meet Tanzania’s growing need for additional power.
PAT, which currently supplies gas primarily for power generation to the Tanzania Electric Supply Company (TANESCO) and Songas, as well as industrial customers, expects to increase its gas production capacity from 113 million standard cubic feet per day to over 250 million standard cubic feet per day in the coming months.
The newly arrived Sakson PR5 drilling rig is expected to commence work on the first of two new wells in late December as part of the ongoing development of the Songo Songo field. In addition, the company expects to spend a further US35m exploring Songo Songo West, which if successful will add significant reserves.
Andrew Brown, General Manager of PanAfrican Energy Tanzania said, ‘’this is a significant milestone for our infrastructure expansion programme and will enable us to double production capacity at Songo Songo and support the Government’s drive to increase the capacity of the national power grid. We are committed to ensuring that we play our part in helping meet the needs of the Tanzanian people.”
The Sakson Rig PR5 is a modern, high-specification powerful rig that has been initially contracted to safely and efficiently drill Well SS-A as part of the ongoing development of Songo Songo. The installation, erection, and commissioning of the Rig including preparations for drilling operations and may take approximately 4 weeks. Drilling is expected to commence on or about 23 December.
PanAfrican Energy Tanzania (PAT) has for the past 10 years been the lead private sector investor in Tanzania’s gas industry, producing up to 102 million standard cubic feet of gas per day. Over 80% of this gas is used for power generation in Tanzania.
A holding company under the Orca Group, PanAfrican Energy Tanzania operates a gas processing facility on Songo Songo Island on behalf of Songas Limited (Songas) on a no loss, no gain basis. The plant supplies natural gas through a 25 km 12" offshore pipeline and a 207 km 16" onshore pipeline and is used mainly by the power sector and industrial markets in the Dar es Salaam area. Songo Songo was Tanzania's first major natural gas development.
Songo Songo West lies approximately 2.5 kilometres west of the main field and is mapped on seismic as having closure on an elongate north-south oriented tilted fault block trap. As with the Songo Songo main field, two reservoirs are envisaged to be present within the SSW prospect – the Neocomian and the Cenomanian, although the primary exploration potential lies within the Neocomian interval. SSW lies entirely within the Company’s Discovery Blocks.
If PAT have invested that much in a bigger better rig for more production of gas, then who is investing on the pipeline that is to carry the gas to the electric production facility and other changes like pressure reduction facilities to go with this?
ReplyDeleteThe problem has never been the volume of gas produced, it has always been the capacity of the pipeline that carries the gas tp the production plant!