Muscat - Following the success of its Amal solar enhanced oil recovery (EOR) pilot project in southern Oman, PDO plans to establish a large solar EOR project that will be 100 times the size of its Amal project in order to reduce the consumption of natural gas in EOR projects.
Speaking at the Oil and Gas West Asia (OGWA) exhibition and conference on Monday, Raoul Restucci, managing director of PDO, said, "Solar energy has numerous advantages. It allows us to free up gas for use in other government priorities like power generation, water desalination and industrial projects."
"The main driver will be the opportunity that we can secure in terms of expansion. We are looking at a solar steam plant that will be 100-fold the size we have today. We will probably be working together with local contractors and suppliers while looking at this opportunity so that solar technology can benefit the whole of Oman beyond the direct impact it will have on the oil and gas industry," he said.
The ninth edition of the OGWA exhibition and conference was formally opened by H E Ali al Sunaidy, Minister of Commerce and Industry at the Oman International Exhibition Centre on Monday.
A technical conference, themed 'Driving Integrated and Innovative EOR,' which ran parallel to the exhibition at the Golden Tulip Hotel, was organised by the Society of Petroleum Engineers.
Speaking to Muscat Daily, Restucci said, "We are engaging government bodies, contractors and suppliers to ensure that we maximise the local supply chain in the solar EOR project."
He said that the solar project may be established over a few phases or tranches. "In the next tranche, we are targeting something around a 100-fold increase to what we have at the moment. We are working together with GlassPoint to establish the local supply chain for solar EOR and are working hard to ensure we can progress as fast as we can."
Restucci said that around 11 per cent of PDO production will be from EOR in 2014 with the contribution expected to triple by 2023.
"The windfall that can be generated from solar technology in Oman is very significant - from R&D, design and deployment of technology," Restucci added.
In his speech at the conference, H E Salim al Aufi, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Oil and Gas, said Oman is a global leader in EOR. But at the same time EOR presents lots of challenges and the most prominent is the higher consumption of gas.
"With the solar pilot project, PDO is working to minimise the need for gas to generate steam to produce energy. It is quite an innovative project and one of the largest in the world," he added.
© Muscat Daily 2014
