Enquest lowers short-term production guidance

Enquest lowered its full-year production forecast as a result of prolonged commissioning which led to lower-than-expected operational efficiency from the floating production storage and offloading vessel at its Kraken field.

Full-year production was now pegged at 74,030 barrels of oil equivalent per day or twice the half-year number, plus or minus 10%, the company said in a statement.

However, the company indicated that it was only a reduction in it short-term guidance with Enquest chief Amjad Bseisu predicting production would reach and plateau at 50,000 bopd in the first half of 2018.

Bseisu said: "The FPSO however is a complex vessel, designed and built to manage the heavy oil from the Kraken development, and it is taking longer than expected to commission during this initial period. Nonetheless, we have been very pleased with reservoir performance and the flow rates achieved on individual wells.

"While we have seen natural declines in EnQuest's existing production base in H1 2017, Kraken is on course to drive a material increase in EnQuest's production in 2018 and beyond."