Nigerian crudes for March steady on healthy demand from Europe, India: Sources

Nigerian crudes for March loading have sold well with less than 10 cargoes unsold from the March program, because of healthy demand from Europe and India, although the remaining grades were struggling to sell, sources said Wednesday.

More Nigerian crudes are expected to head to Europe in March compared to February, which was boosting some of the Nigerian light sweets, sources said. West African Suezmax freight rates have fallen sharply in the last months which has made the West Africa-to-Europe arbitrage more economical.

Freight rates for a Suezmax on a West Africa-to-Northwest Europe route were pegged near Worldscale 50-55 Wednesday, a fall of almost w80 points since early January.

According to Platts tracking data, at least 25 cargoes or 36% of the Nigerian cargoes loading in March will be going to Europe, compared with at least 15-17 cargoes or 25% in February.

But sources said spot activity stayed thin with an industry event in London this week, with about five to 10 March cargoes still unsold.

2014 outlook for the Ghanaian oil and gas sector

The year 2013 was very eventful for the Oil and Gas sector in Ghana with the passage of the Legislative Instrument (L.I.) on local content and local participation in petroleum activities being one of the headline occurrences.

The establishment of the Enterprise Development Corporation in Takoradi, the re-submission of the draft Petroleum Exploration and Production Bill to Cabinet for approval, and the progress made on the construction of the gas plant were also notable events of 2013.

Schlumberger introduces new fracturing technique

Schlumberger announced today the introduction of the BroadBand Sequence* fracturing technique, which enables sequential stimulation of perforation clusters in wells drilled in unconventional reservoirs. This new technique sequentially isolates fractures at the wellbore to ensure every cluster in each zone is fractured resulting in greater production and completion efficiency compared to conventional methods.

Developed using a composite fluid comprising a proprietary blend of degradable fibers and multimodal particles, the BroadBand Sequence technique is suited for use in new wells and in recompletions. This technique is particularly suitable for re-fracturing operations, given its ability to promote temporary cluster isolation without the aid of mechanical devices such as bridge plugs.

“Optimizing the stimulation of wellbore perforation clusters in unconventional reservoirs is a significant challenge for our industry,” said Amerino Gatti, president, Well Services, Schlumberger. “The BroadBand Sequence technique addresses this challenge and increases our customers’ well production by enhancing stimulation contact in every zone in the reservoir.”

This fracturing technique has delivered robust and consistent performance in more than 500 operations conducted to date in several unconventional plays including the Eagle Ford, Haynesville, Woodford, Spraberry and Bakken shales.

The BroadBand Sequence fracturing technique has enabled customers in South Texas to increase production from new completions in unconventional reservoirs by more than 20%. It has also reduced well completion time by up to 46% in plug-and-perf operations by stimulating longer intervals compared with conventional methods. In addition, this technology was applied to a well in South Texas for a refracturing operation, which resulted in double the production with a fourfold increase in flowing pressure.

BroadBand Sequence is the first release of a family of BroadBand completion technologies aimed at maximizing well productivity in unconventional reservoirs.

For more information about the BroadBand Sequence fracturing technique, visitwww.slb.com/BroadBand