Summer Jade Duplantis
September 20, 2011
Alvin Harding Sr.
September 22, 2011
Chevron Corp. announced a new oil discovery in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico approximately 216 miles south of Vermillion Parish at the Moccasin prospect.
The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement permitted the exploration project in March, which was the first completely new exploration plan the agency approved after the ban on deepwater drilling was lifted last October.
The discovery was made in the Keathley Canyon Block 736, where Well No. 1 encountered more than 380 feet of net pay in the Lower Tertiary Wilcox Sands more than seven miles below the water’s surface, Chevron said.
The well is located in approximately 6,800 feet of water and drilled at a depth of 31,500 feet.
Further evaluation of the well is needed before the extent of the resource is known, Chevron officials said.
“The Moccasin discovery underscores the importance of the deepwater Gulf of Mexico as a source of domestic energy for the United States and as a focus area for Chevron’s worldwide exploration portfolio,” Chevron Corp. Vice Chairman George Kirkland said.
Exxon Mobil announced in June it had found an estimated 700 million barrels of oil equivalent in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico.
Chett Chiasson, executive director of offshore exploration support hub Port Fourchon, said Chevron’s discovery, coupled with Exxon’s find, helps the port’s “longevity.”
“It means supplying the necessary commodities that we do supply out of Port Fourchon in servicing those wells, and it means work,” he said. “It means tax dollars to the community, and it means jobs for our people.”
The Greater Lafourche Port Commission responded to the moratorium on offshore exploration by reducing its basic land rental rates by 30 percent and freezing its annual escalation of those rates.
Those modifications were lifted and the port resumed regular operations July 1. Instead of losing tenants, however, Chiasson said Port Fourchon has actually gained a few. Still, the top priority, the port director stressed, is ensuring permits are granted on a regular basis.
“It looks like people are planning for the future, 2012 and 2013,” Chiasson said. “We certainly are not where we were prior to the moratorium, but it’s better than it was six months ago.”
Chevron operated the Moccasin discovery well with a 43.75 percent working interest in the prospect. BP owns 43.75 percent of the prospect, and Samson Offshore Company, a private exploration-and-production company headquartered in Tulsa, Okla., holds the remaining interest.
Chevron first drilled the Moccasin well in March 2010 before suspending the operation two months later when President Obama invoked a moratorium on deepwater drilling.
Drilling resumed in March of this year, when BOEMRE granted Chevron the fifth post-moratorium deepwater permit in the Gulf of Mexico.
The find was also the first post-moratorium permit for a reservoir that hadn’t previously produced oil.
“Moccasin is an important addition to our queue of high-quality opportunities around the globe,” Kirkland said.
Chevron is contracted with the Marine Well Containment Corporation to satisfy BOEMRE’s requirement that operators demonstrate an ability to contain the discharge of a worst-case scenario blowout, a regulation imposed following the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster last year.
Kevin Wiemann Jr., of Bourg, readies the gas pump at the Chevron gas station on the corner of Savanne Road and La. Highway 311 in Houma. ERIC BESSON
