OMV New Zealand set to resume production from the Maari oil-field

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Image credit: www.omv.com

OMV New Zealand announced that it will resume production of oil this week from the Maari oil-field which is located 80km off the Taranaki Coast.

Image credit: www.omv.com

The company halted production from the field in November last year after a crack was discovered in one of the well-head platform’s 12 horizontal struts during a scheduled inspection.

To remedy the problem, it contracted specialist advisors AMOG who devised an intermediate solution in the form of three clamps that were installed by air divers from Fitzroy Engineering and NZ Diving and Salvage.

“This secured the damaged strut on Level 3, about 4 metres below the waterline. The repair was independently verified by Lloyds, both during the design phase and post-installation,” the company told the ASX.

Adertisement

“OMV has also completed a full electromagnetic inspection of all nodes (strut and leg connections) on level 3 and undertook a Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) inspection of the entire platform structure which stands in approximately 100m of water.”

OMV said two permanent solutions are currently being investigated by AMOG and Worley Parsons, with the preferred concept to be selected this month.

“During the interim repair period OMV resumed its planned shutdown maintenance programme that has been scheduled to start 5 December. This included completing the replacement of a water injection flowline. Two specialist support vessels, from Maersk and DOF, were contracted for this week,” the company said.

“Maintenance work on the field’s production risers (flexible pipes connected between the wellhead platform and the floating production vessel Raroa) was also undertaken during the shutdown.”

The Maari filed is operated by OMV (69%) on behalf of the Maari JV which includes Todd Maari Ltd (16%), Horizon Oil International (10%) and Cue Taranaki (5%).