Vaca Muerta: works to improve the system are advancing
It will have the capacity to transport up to 125,000 barrels of oil per day and, in addition to Shell, it may be used by third-party operators who want to contract the use of it.
The project will make it possible to expand the current network, pave the way to increase production and facilitate the evacuation of crude oil to refineries in the province of Buenos Aires and export points by relieving the existing bottleneck in midstream infrastructure due to the strong increase of production that was produced in Vaca Muerta.
Taking only the case of Shellproduction went from 6,000 and 8,000 barrels per day in 2018 to around 45,000 currently. Midstream includes transportation as well as storage and wholesale marketing of crude or refined petroleum products.
At the opening ceremony next Tuesday in Neuquén, authorities such as the Minister of Economy, Sergio Massaand the Secretary of Energy of the Nation, Flavia Royón; and the governors of Río Negro, Arabela Carreras and from Nequén, Omar Gutiérrezamong other national and provincial authorities and those of the 10 municipalities that the project crosses.
When meeting with company authorities, the Undersecretary of Hydrocarbons, Federico Bernal, claimed last week that capacity is currently “saturated” with a situation “very similar” to natural gas. “In that case, the national government’s response was the construction of the President Néstor Kirchner Gas Pipeline,” the official recalled.
Bernal estimated that In 2023, investments in exploration and exploitation are expected for US$9.5 billionwhich will imply a year-on-year rise of 20%, the highest figure since 2015.
Sierras Blancas-Allen pipeline: the keys to this strategic work
The project, which will be formally inaugurated on Tuesday but has already been in operation since the end of last year, was built in a record time of just nine months and is Shell’s first investment in midstream in its 108-year presence in the country.
The project consortium is made up of Shell, as the winner and leader (with a 60% stake), Pan American Energy (25%) and Pluspetrol (15%); and the construction was in charge of Techint-SIMA, with the operation of the pipeline in charge of Oleoductos del Valle (Oldelval).
More than 50 contractors and suppliers were involved in the work, mostly of national and regional origin. Shell has invested more than US$2,000 million in Vaca Muerta and, in 2022 alone, invested US$500 million in the development of training resources, the company indicated.
In his operation White Sierras, Shell it has two processing plants with a joint capacity of 42,000 barrels per day, and generates more than 3,000 direct and indirect jobs.
The oil pipeline to be inaugurated by the company will be linked in Allen with the main oil pipeline that receives oil from the Neuquén Basin, which is operated by Oldelval, a concessionary firm that plans to invest US$750 million in its Duplicate Project.
This pipeline allows the evacuation of oil from Dead cow to the refineries -for use in the local market- and to the points of exploitation.
He Project Duplicate plans to increase the current transportation capacity of 36,000 cubic meters per day to 86,000 cubic meters, equivalent to 540,940 barrels per day with the construction of 455 kilometers of pipes between the Allen and Saligral pumping stations
Once the expansion of the trunk pipeline – which includes a new terminal station in Puerto Rosales in Bahia Blanca-, the country’s oil exports may increase to between 230,000 and 320,000 barrels per dayequivalent to an annual foreign exchange income of between US$5,000 million and US$8,000 million.
The Oldelval project is already underway with the arrival of the first pipes and the assembly of the workshop last October, and it will be carried out in two phases, with an estimated work period of 22 months.
Source: Ambito
