Rhum gas field
The Rhum gas field ( Persian میدان گازی رام) is located 390 km northeast of Aberdeen in the Scottish coastal waters of the North Sea at a depth of 109 m.
history
Gas production and export began on December 20, 2005. Development of the Rhum project was approximately £ 350 million . Before production began, Rhum was the largest remaining undeveloped gas storage facility on the British continental shelf of the North Sea. The partners of the Rhum project are BP (Operator) and Iranian Oil Company (UK) Limited (a subsidiary of the National Iranian Oil Company ) with 50% each. The Rhum field is a high temperature, high pressure natural gas reservoir with borehole temperatures of 150 ° C and pressures of 12,700 psi . In comparison, the Bruce gas field has temperatures of 99 ° C and pressures of 6000 psi.
Rhum, located in Block 3/29, was discovered in 1977 from Well 3 / 29a-2. An earlier well (3 / 29-1) drilled in 1973 was abandoned due to the high pressure gas. With the combination of a high pressure high temperature gas storage (HPHT), which was connected using a long-distance underwater connection, the use of rhum is seen by BP as a world first. Plateau production of 300 million standard cubic feet per day is expected from the field. Experts estimate the total recoverable reserves at 2 million barrels of crude oil and 800 billion cubic feet of gas (23 billion cubic meters).
The field is connected to the Bruce platform operated by BP via a 44 km high-pressure pipeline that includes a main pipe-in-pipe line protected by the HIPPS ( High Integrity Pipeline Protection System ) system . New gas processing equipment was installed on the existing platform of the Bruce Compression Reception Center (CR) to process the Rhum gas. Gas is exported from Bruce to St Fergus via the Frigg pipeline system and the associated condensate is piped into the Forties pipeline system via Bruce.
Sanctions since 2010
The on-site cooperation had been suspended since November 2010 after the EU imposed sanctions on the Iranian oil and gas industry. At the same time, the British government, which had considered the gas field vital to their country, was looking for a way to exempt gas from the Rhum field from sanctions. Finally, at a meeting of the EU member states in December 2013, a treaty was passed that exempted local activities from the provisions of unilateral sanctions against Iran. After the sanctions were eased in December 2013, the British government put the rhum field under a temporary management plan and blocked the Iranian share of the income from gas sales in a separate account until the sanctions were lifted. Although the sanctions were eased in December 2013, it took almost two years to resume production due to technical problems. On October 10, 2018, the USA granted BP and Serita Energy a new license to continue operating the gas field in the North Sea. This is one of the rare exceptions the Trump administration grants on the eve of the oil sanctions against Iran.
Web links
Coordinates: 58 ° 26 ′ 34.8 " N , 2 ° 19 ′ 48" E