|
 GERMANY
North West Europe
Germany is a very maturely explored area. German
production is concentrated in three regions - the NW, the Alpine
foreland and minor oil from the upper Rhine graben.
 These areas have been intensively explored and have also
witnessed extended EOR activities, particularly during the mid 1980s and
mid 1990s. Some short-lived increases in production were made but
potential for further EOR projects is limited.
Offshore: Just one gas/condensate and one oil
field produce offshore Germany. The A6/B4 gas/condensate field was
discovered in 1974 and began production in 2000 from a small six-legged
steel platform in 48 m of water tied back to the F-3 platform in the
Netherlands through dual 117 km pipelines. Condensate is stripped and
carried from F-3 by tanker whilst gas is exported through the dedicated
Nogat pipeline to Den Helder.
 The other field, Mittelplate, lies close to shore in
tidal flats and was discovered in 1980. It came onstream from several
sandstone layers at depths between 2,000 and 3,000 m in 1987 using an
artificial island. It produces over a quarter of Germany’s oil and is
Germany’s biggest field.
The island is located in the southern part of the
Wattenmeer National Park in the North German state of
Schleswig-Holstein. Germany’s national park legislation puts the
facilities in a Category 2 Protection Zone where commercial exploitation
of the tidelands is to some extent permitted.
Oil is transported in specially designed barges to
Brunsbüttel Port from where it is piped to refineries. The larger
western section of the field continues to be developed from the
artificial island but since mid-2000 extended reach wells have tapped
the eastern end of the field from onshore locations. The oil produced
via these wells is processed at Dieksand Land Station and then piped to
Brunsbüttel.
|
Back to EUROPE & THE FSU