Italian oilfield services company Saipem has secured a contract valued at $400 million to perform drilling offshore the Ivory Coast.
The contract has been awarded by the joint venture between Eni Côte d’Ivoire and the state-owned Petroci, who are active in a number of exploration blocks off the Ivorian coast.
Saipem noted that the $400 million is to be considered gross of the leasing costs of the Deep Value Driller vessel that will be used for the operations. It is a seventh-generation drillship, one of the most modern in the world, for which Saipem has entered into a charter agreement with the company Deep Value Driller.
Saipem is thus strengthening the competitiveness of its fleet by leveraging its consolidated expertise in the selection and management of technologically advanced vessels, the company said in its statement.
Saipem further stressed that the award of this contract represents an important consolidation of its presence in the Ivory Coast, a strategic area where the company is currently executing the project for the development of the oil and gas field Baleine.
The discovery was made in block CI-101 offshore Ivory Coast by Saipem 10,000 drill ship. The Baleine prospect, according to Eni, is the first exploration well drilled by the company in the Ivory Coast, and the first commercial discovery in the country in 20 years. The potential of the discovery is estimated of over 2.0 billion barrels of oil in place and approximately 2.4 trillion cubic feet (TCF) of associated gas, with potential upside.
Eni is active in Blocks CI-100, CI-101, CI-205 and in 2019 it signed contracts for the two new exploration blocks CI-501 and CI-504 located in the eastern part of the sedimentary basin off the coast of Ivory Coast. The CI-501 block lies between 330 and 7,874 feet underwater, about miles south-west of the capital Abidjan. The CI-504 block is between 3280 and 7710 feet, about 37 miles south-west of the capital.
