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PRIO receives drilling license for Wahoo Field
With a total investment of US$ 850 million, the project is expected to produce up to 40,000 barrels of oil per day
Rio de Janeiro, February 28 – PRIO, the largest independent oil and gas company in Brazil, received its drilling license for the Wahoo field in the Campos Basin, Espírito Santo, from the Brazilian Institute for the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (IBAMA) today (February 28). With this, the company will start mobilizing the Hunter Queen rig for the drilling campaign, which includes six wells: four producing wells and two injection wells.
“Wahoo is our priority and a project we have been preparing for for a long time. In addition to increasing our production by up to 40,000 barrels per day, its operation will boost the economy with jobs and, in the future, generate over R$ 4 billion in royalties for Espírito Santo and the Federal Government over its lifetime,” said CEO Roberto Monteiro. Even before the operation, the project has already generated around R$ 1 billion in the local supply chain.
The next phase of the project is the assessment of the Environmental Impact Study – crucial for issuing the preliminary license and the installation license for the subsea infrastructure that will make production possible. “While we take the next steps regarding licensing, we continue to make adjustments to the Frade FPSO to accommodate the new production,” says Francilmar Fernandes, PRIO’s Chief Operating Officer.
Wahoo: tieback as a development solution
The Wahoo field is the first to be fully developed by PRIO. The Wahoo field is the first to be fully developed by PRIO. Production will be made possible by a tieback of around 30 km linking Wahoo to the FPSO Frade, which has a processing capacity of 100,000 barrels of oil per day.
Acquired in March 2021, the field was declared commercial in December of the same year, following feasibility studies. Although there are already exploratory wells that prove the presence of oil, the previous operator did not develop the necessary infrastructure for production. “The interconnection with the FPSO Frade is fundamental to the success of the project, since without this structure, Wahoo would be economically unfeasible,” says PRIO’s Chief Operating Officer.