Plexus grows North Africa business

OE Staff Apr 23, 2014

Oil and gas engineering services business Plexus Holdings has been awarded a contract with Galp Energia Tarfya to supply surface wellhead and mudline equipment services for an exploration well offshore Morocco.

At its March capital markets day, Galp said its scheduled drilling program for 2014 includes the drilling of 7-9 exploration and appraisal wells, including one exploration well to be drilled in the Trident oil prospect in Morocco.

Trident is in the Tarfaya offshore area, in which Galp Energia signed a farm-in agreement, taking a 50% stake and operatorship, in 2012. The area includes eight exploration permits, known as Tarfaya Offshore I to VIII, covering 11,281sq km, on the Atlantic Margin, offshore Morocco, in less than 200m water depth.

According to Galp, the Tarfaya offshore permits are located in an under-explored area and within a proven petroleum system, containing multiple prospects and leads within Jurassic and Cretaceous sediments, as well as emerging potential within the Tertiary and Triassic formations. The already identified prospects in the Tarfaya offshore area include Assaka, Trident, Tarfaya Marin-A (TMA) and La Dam.

Plexus will supply its 18-3/4in. POS-GRIP surface wellhead and mudline systems for use on a standard pressure 6000 PSI exploration well.

The contract, which sees Plexus secure a new territory and strengthen its position in North Africa, is worth about £600,000.

Plexus CEO Ben Van Bilderbeek said: “Today’s contract with Galp for an exploration well offshore Morocco demonstrates our core wellhead equipment and services rental business continues to win new orders with new customers and in new territories. Having established a dominant position supplying HP/HT wellhead equipment in the North Sea, we are successfully expanding our geographical reach into Asia and Africa. Approximately 50% of our 1H sales were for wells in the rest of the world, compared to 28% the previous year. We are confident that the compelling combination of superior performance and cost savings that our equipment offers will see Plexus continue to build market share outside our North Sea stronghold.”

Africa