TGS-SLB joint venture embarks on its seventh acquisition program

Outlook & Strategy

February 5, 2024, by Zerina Maksumic

Norwegian provider of energy data and intelligence TGS and oilfield services company SLB are set to perform ocean bottom node (OBN) multi-client acquisition in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, representing the seventh program within the seismic joint venture.

Starting in the first quarter of 2024, Engagement phase 5 is said to involve the acquisition of 157 OCS blocks, equaling approximately 3,650 square kilometers, through a long offset, sparse OBN survey.

According to TGS, the data coverage expansion in the eastern part of Green Canyon will connect with previous phases, creating a continuous coverage area extending over 23,000 square kilometers from the Mississippi Canyon in the east to Garden Banks in the west.

The Gulf of Mexico Lease Sale 261, which recently took place attracted 16 winning bids and a total bid value of more than $40 million.

The Engagement 5 dataset aims to provide support to existing and prospective leaseholders as well as regional explorers by offering technically advanced subsurface imaging. TGS also said that this is achieved through the utilization of long offset data and the implementation of elastic full-waveform inversion (eFWI). Preliminary data results will be available in the second half of 2024.

“Once again, we are pleased to announce alongside our project partner, SLB, the expansion of our multi-client OBN data portfolio in the US Gulf of Mexico. Engagement 5 represents a key milestone, enabling contiguous coverage between prior phases of an ongoing initiative that continues to deliver game-changing subsurface imaging for our clients,” said Kristian Johansen, CEO at TGS.

The project is supported by industry funding.

TGS and SLB recently secured pre-funding in a consortium with PGS to expand multi-client seismic data coverage in the Sabah Basin offshore Malaysia.

It is also worth mentioning that on December 1, 2023, TGS completed a 410-day deepwater node survey campaign offshore Guyana ahead of schedule, setting a record for the longest deepwater node survey.