Petrobras picks permanent reservoir monitoring system for Brazil’s third largest oil field

Brazilian oil and gas giant Petrobras has awarded Alcatel Submarine Networks (ASN) and Maersk Supply Service (MSS) with a contract for the supply and installation of a permanent reservoir monitoring (PRM) system on a field located in the Santos Basin offshore Brazil.

The contract includes the engineering, procurement, construction, installation, and operation of the PRM system which will be used to monitor and optimize oil production from the Mero field located deep offshore in the pre-salt area of the Santos Basin, 180 kilometers off the coast of Rio de Janeiro.

“The motivations for investing in a frequent, high density/high repeatability 4D scheme on Merostems from the anticipated added value of 4D information to directly assist a production drive, based on WAG – alternating water and gas reinjection,” Petrobras stated.

The PRM system is based on the Optowave technology developed by ASN Norway. ASN will mobilize its resources and subcontractors in Europe and in Brazil to complete the engineering, manufacturing, installation and commissioning of the PRM system.

Maersk Supply Service will project manage, engineer and execute the offshore installation, operating out of its office in Rio de Janeiro and using one of its I-Class subsea support vessels to perform the operation.

“We are delighted to cooperate with Petrobras to deploy the Optowave system, as the first pre-salt PRM with more than 4400 4-components stations in deep waters,” said Alain Biston, President of Alcatel Submarine Networks.

“ASN is also pleased to deliver this system with the collaboration of Maersk Supply Service, who has a large vessel fleet in Brazil with specialized capabilities and assets for this project.”

According to ASN, once Optowave PRM systems catch active seismic data, it is transferred to onshore processing centers and processed in order to provide high-resolution images of the reservoir.

The images are used to characterize the reservoir and are compared over the years to assess changes in reservoir pressure and the location and movement of the fluids. Interpretation of the PRM data is set to contribute to improving reservoir management and accordingly enabling to increase the oil recovery.

Mero is Brazil’s third largest field by volume of oil in place, behind only Tupi and Búzios, also located in the pre-salt Santos Basin.

Production on the field started on 30 April 2022 through the FPSO Guanabara. This January, Petrobras disclosed that the FPSO had reached its maximum production capacity, with the mark of 180,000 barrels of oil per day (bpd).

The operation of the unitized Mero field is conducted by the consortium operated by Petrobras (38.6 per cent), in partnership with Shell Brasil Petróleo (19.3 per cent), TotalEnergies EP Brasil (19.3 per cent), CNODC Brasil Petróleo e Gás (9.65 per cent), CNOOC Petroleum Brasil (9.65 per cent) and Pré-Sal Petróleo (PPSA) (3.5 per cent).