Louisiana Port in the Eye of Katrina

123jump.com Staff
28 Aug, 2005
New York City

Eighteen percent of the nation's energy flows through a very narrow two-lane highway handling more than 10,000 daily vehicle traffic used by cargo and 6,000 port employees. Now Katrina threatnes to close that down. According to latest EIA report if this road is closed for more than two weeks gasoline prices can skyrocket. Louisiana generates more than $5 billion in taxes to the federal government but very little of that is shared in the local development.

Category one hurricane Katrina, after leaving more than 1.5 million people without electricity for more than a day, is on its way as category 4 hurricane to Port Fourchon, Louisiana. The second landfall of this year’s fourth hurricane is expected to directly reach oil and gas infrastructure in the Gulf of Mexico.

According to National Hurricane Center, Katrina could strengthen to Category 5 before making landfall. The fall of hurricane is predicted to be anywhere between western Louisiana to Panama City, Florida.

According to U.S. Minerals and Management Services, the region of Gulf of Mexico accounts for daily crude oil production between 1.5 million barrels of oil and 10 and 11 billion cubic feet of natural gas. The region has seen intense level of activity in the last three years in search of energy using deep water drilling technology.

Port Fourchon is important oil and gas city for the nation’s domestic and import oil activities. About 13% of U.S. oil import flows through the port and 27% of domestic production flows through the pipeline hub located in the city according to MMS.

Hurricane Katrina's projected path across the Gulf continues to move west. As of late Friday evening, Shell has evacuated a total of 465 offshore personnel and will continue to evacuate all remaining Gulf of Mexico staff, with the exception of those at our assets far to the west. Total planned evacuations for Saturday include 554 additional personnel.


Gulf of Mexico based major oil and gas producing facilities:


EXXON


Exxon Mobil Corporation is a partner in the startup of production from the Princess field sub-sea wells, located approximately 140 miles southeast of New Orleans in the Gulf of Mexico. Production at the field is currently flowing at an approximate rate of 9,000 to 13,000 barrels of oil and 15 million cubic feet of gas per day. Production began on December 17, 2003.


CHEVRON

The company is the largest producer of crude oil and natural gas in the Gulf
of Mexico Shelf, with average daily net production rates of 101,000 barrels of crude oil, 750 million cubic feet of natural gas and 14,000 barrels of natural gas liquids in 2004. It’s one of the largest operators of deepwater blocks in the Gulf.

In the Gulf of Mexico, Tahiti Platform drilled the deepest successful production test well in the area's history, to 25,812 feet. With capacity of 325,000 barrels per day, Pascagoula Refinery is company's largest wholly owned refinery located in the region.


SHELL

Hurricane Katrina's projected path across the Gulf continues to move west. As of late Friday evening, Shell has evacuated a total of 465 offshore personnel and will continue to evacuate all remaining Gulf of Mexico staff, with the exception of those at our assets far to the west. Total planned evacuations for Saturday include 554 additional personnel.

On Friday, Shell began the process to shut-in production for two sub-sea fields, Tahoe and Crosby. However, all of Shell's central and easternmost Gulf of Mexico assets will likely be shut-in by the end of Saturday, the 27th. The rate of the total anticipated daily production impact, once those assets are fully shut-in, is estimated at 420 thousand barrels of oil and 1,345 million cubic feet of gas per day.


MURPHY OIL


Front Runner and Front Runner South, discovered during 2001 in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico, are located in Green Canyon Blocks 338 and 339 and are thought to include estimated reserves of 200 million barrels of oil equivalent. Murphy owns a 37.5% working interest in both discoveries. Murphy and its partners sanctioned the development for Front Runner and Front Runner South in early 2002 and first production was achieved in December 2004 producing through the first of eight wells to be tied into the facility. The development is a Truss Spar-type Floating Production System with a peak handling capacity of 60,000 bpd of oil and 110 million cubic feet a day of natural gas.

In 1999, the discovery well at Medusa (60%) was drilled to a total depth of 16,241 feet and encountered over 160 net feet of oil in three sands. During 2000, favorable results were achieved from the fourth well at Medusa, which encountered over 200 feet of net pay and has extended gross reserve estimates to around 100 million barrels of oil equivalent recoverable. First production from the field was achieved at the end of November 2003 through a floating spar production facility. During 2004, production at Medusa will ramp up as six wells will be tied into the spar facility.

BHP

Participants:

Typhoon: BHP Billiton Petroleum 50%; ChevronTexaco 50%
Boris: BHP Billiton Petroleum 50%; ChevronTexaco 25%; Noble Energy, Inc 25%
Genesis: BHP Billiton Petroleum 4.95%; ChevronTexaco 56.67%; ExxonMobil 38.38%
West Cameron 76 (and 60, 61, 77): BHP Billiton Petroleum (Americas) Inc - interest ranges between 33.76% to 78.8%
Green Canyon 18 (and Ewing Bank 988): BHP Billiton Petroleum (Americas) Inc 25%
Green Canyon 60: BHP Billiton Petroleum (Americas) Inc 45%
Production (FY 2004 - BHP Billiton share): 6.6 million barrels of liquids; 18.9 billion cubic feet of gas
Location: All production is located offshore Louisiana and BHP owns interests in 400 feeder blocks.

ANADARKO PETROLEUM

Anadarko owns an average of 73 percent of 190 deepwater blocks in the Gulf of Mexico.

The company's first deepwater discovery, the 100 percent owned Marco Polo field, was made in April 2000 and is located on Green Canyon Block 608 about 160 miles south of New Orleans, Louisiana. Located in 4,300 feet of water, the field achieved first production in July 2004.

Beyond being a single-field development project, Marco Polo anchors a hub-and-spoke facility. The floating production facility, which is owned by a third party and operated by Anadarko, was built to handle 120,000 barrels of oil a day (b/d) and 300 million cubic feet of gas a day.

Anadarko has continued to aggressively explore the Green Canyon area with excellent results. In September 2002, Anadarko and partners discovered the K2 field, and in November 2003, Anadarko discovered the K2 North field. Both projects will be tied back to the Marco Polo platform and are expected to begin production in mid-2005.

Port Fourchon, LA

Port Fourchon currently services all of the Gulf of Mexico's deepwater projects, which accounts for over 75% of the Gulf's deepwater oil production.

MMS Projects Port Fourchon will service 44% of pending future deepwater projects.

In addition to is huge domestic hydrocarbon significance, Port Fourchon, is the land base for LOOP, which handles 13-15% of the nation's foreign oil and is connected to 30% of US refining capacity.

Port Fourchon plays a stragetic role in supporting transporting and securing 16-18% of the entire United States energy supply.