Natural gas production has begun earlier than planned at Argentina’s Fenix offshore field, French oil major TotalEnergies TTE-N said on Friday.
The $700-million project, initially scheduled to begin operating in November, has a production capacity of 10 million cubic metres of natural gas per day, representing 8 per cent of Argentina’s total production and about 7 per cent of annual consumption.
The gas from the Fenix field off its southern coast in Tierra del Fuego is destined for domestic consumption, as Argentina seeks to reduce imports, deregulate local prices, promote energy investment and turn itself into a liquefied natural gas exporter.
TotalEnergies operates a quarter of Argentina’s production, the most of any private company, with operations in the Vaca Muerta formation, the world’s second-largest unconventional gas reserve, as well as several projects in Tierra del Fuego.
Fenix uses an unmanned offshore platform connected to already-existing subsea pipelines and gas treatment plants, making the project cheaper and less polluting.
TotalEnergies said the carbon intensity of the project – which measures the amount of greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere as a percentage of oil or gas produced – was 9 kilograms of CO2-equivalent per barrel of oil-equivalent (CO2e/boe).
The company ceiling for new projects is 18 CO2-e/boe.
“With its low break-even and low carbon intensity, Fenix perfectly matches the company’s low-cost and low-emission strategy,” Javier Rielo, Senior Vice President Americas, Exploration & Production at TotalEnergies, said in a statement.
TotalEnergies has a 37.5 per cent operating interest in Fenix, alongside BP’s Pan American Sur with 25 per cent and London-listed Harbour Energy, which purchased Wintershall Dea’s upstream portfolio holding a 37.5 per cent stake in December.