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Wahoo Field will be PRIO’s highlight at Rio Oil&Gas 2022
Rio de Janeiro, September 2022 – Starting on September 26th, the attentions of the oil market will be turned to the 20th Rio Oil&Gas, one of the most important events of the sector in the world. It will be in this scenario that PRIO (B3: PRIO3 – formerly PetroRio), the largest independent oil and gas company in Brazil and a pioneer in recovering and increasing the useful life of mature fields, will present to the public the details of the kick-off of operations in the Wahoo Field, located in the Campos Basin.
With an investment of around U$ 800 million, this is the first project developed from scratch by PRIO, designed to be a subsea tieback with the Frade Field, having no production unit. The company declared the Wahoo Field commerciality in December 2021 and since then has been preparing to start drilling activities, which are expected to start in the second half of 2023. With Wahoo, the company expects to reach a daily production of 40,000 barrels, starting in 2024.
There will be four producing wells and two injector wells in Wahoo. Innovative, the project will be executed from a mix of mature technologies that have never been put together like this in Brazil. This combination will allow the production life to be extended to 2050, along with the Frade Field. Wahoo is located 35 km north of Frade, with a water depth of 1,400 m, and has a carbonate reservoir at a depth of between five and seven thousand meters.
“Wahoo opens new frontiers for PRIO, both from an operational and technological point of view, as well as from a marketing point of view. Therefore, even considering all our projects as special, I say that Wahoo is emblematic for its concept of optimizing existing resources, since the viability of this field will be possible because of the subsea tieback with Frade. Our solution is economically viable, allowing for low-cost production, with the least environmental impact possible, increasing the company’s daily production, and with reduced greenhouse gas emissions. It is with great pride that we will present the details of this project at this Rio Oil&Gas,” says PRIO’s COO, Francilmar Fernandes.
Friar’s Field
With the concept ‘Human Energy Generates Energy’, PRIO’s booth at the fair will also promote the work that the company has been developing in the Frade Field, which is located in the Campos Basin, about 125 km from the city of Cabo Frio and 172 km from the Octopus Field. PRIO became 100% owner of this asset and the associated infrastructure in early 2020.
Currently, the Frade Field produces about 30 thousand barrels of oil per day. The Frade revitalization campaign is halfway through its execution and was divided into two phases: the first will be concluded in October 2022, and the second, which was to be concluded in 2025, was brought forward to the beginning of 2023, with the projection of increasing the field’s production by 20%.
East Albacore
Another PRIO highlight at Rio Oil & Gas 2022 will be the Albacora Leste field, in Campos Basin, which belonged to Petrobras and was acquired by the company in April this year. With the investment of $2.2 billion, the acquisition will double PRIO’s size, both in production and in revenue and Ebitda.
With the kick-off of Wahoo, the completion of the revitalization of the Frade Field and taking over the Albacora East field, PRIO will more than double its production in the next three years, going from the current 50 thousand barrels/day to an estimated 120 thousand barrels/day.
About PRIO
PRIO is the largest independent oil and gas company in Brazil, a pioneer in recovering and increasing the useful life of fields in production. With its assets located in the Campos Basin, the company seeks operational efficiency with process optimization, the use of new technologies and innovative solutions that aim to reduce costs, always with the premise of excellence and safety in operations. PRIO has been growing through acquisitions. Thanks to the constant positive results, it had a strong appreciation, becoming part of the B3 index, the main Brazilian stock exchange index in 2020.