ExxonM makes third oil discovery in Suriname

May 18, 2024 ExxonMobil, News, Oil & Gas

Map showing location of Suriname’s Block 52 where Exxon and Petronas recently made a new discovery

Kaieteur News – U.S. oil major, Exxon Mobil and Malaysian energy company, Petronas, have made a third oil discovery in Suriname.

Petronas made the announcement on Wednesday of the hydrocarbon discovery in Block 52 at the Fusaea-1 exploration well in Suriname’s Block 52. The discovery is located about 170 kilometres offshore and 9 kilometers east from Roystonea-1, an earlier oil discovery.

The well was spud in Feb 2024 and successfully drilled to a total depth of 5,227 metres with zero (0) LTI, encountering several oil and gas-bearing Campanian sandstone reservoir packages. Further evaluation is being undertaken to determine the full extent of this discovery and its potential for an integrated development with the recent Roystonea-1 and Sloanea-1 discoveries.

Block 52, which covers an area of 4,749 square kilometres, is located north of the coast of Paramaribo, Suriname’s capital city, within the prospective Suriname-Guyana basin. Petronas Suriname E&P is the operator of Block 52 with a 50% participating interest together with ExxonMobil.

Addressing the recent deepwater discovery by Petronas in Suriname, Mark Oberstoetter, Head of Americas Upstream, said, “We understand Roystonea and Fusaea’s recoverable resources are approaching 400 million barrels. This could be enough to support an FPSO (Floating Production, Storage and Offloading vessel) with an oil processing capacity of up to 100,000 b/d FPSO development.”

Wood Mackenzie, a global provider of data and analytics for the energy transition reported that nine deepwater fields have been discovered in Suriname waters since 2019, but the country still awaits its first sanctioned development.

According to Wood Mackenzie, TotalEnergies and APA Corporation are close to sanctioning a cluster FPSO development on Block 58. Block 52 is east of Block 58 and has different owners. Fusaea is the third discovery in the block, following Sloanea and Roystonea.

“In addition, APA Corporation, Petronas and CEPSA drilled the 2022 Baja discovery in Block 53. This is eight kilometres north of Roystonea and could eventually be part of a wider cluster development,” continued Oberstoetter.

Petronas has already secured tax relief if it develops gas on the block. The 2020 Sloanea discovery is now being appraised with a second well.

Wood Mackenzie now holds Suriname’s discovered resources at more than 2.4 billion barrels of oil and liquids and more than 12.5 tcf of gas.

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discovery, FPSO, oil, production, Suriname

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