The Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), Mr Alexander Mould has said the start of commercial oil production from the Tweneboa-Enyenra-Ntomme (TEN) fields in the Western Region will boost Ghana’s economic growth.

President John Mahama will commission First Oil from the fields today, Thursday, 18 August.

“This is a momentous day for Ghana and as the national oil company, GNPC is pleased to have played its part in bringing our second oil production field to fruition. This is a culmination of more than a decade of work, which begun with GNPC producing credible data on our oil fields, which convinced international investors who would eventually become the TEN partner to invest in the project.

“The TEN fields will drive economic growth in Ghana through the marketing of crude oil and [also] boost gas supply to generate power for industrial and domestic use. The fact that the TEN project has come on stream just six years after the Jubilee Fields goes a long way to demonstrate GNPC’s commitment to ensuring that Ghana benefits from its oil and gas resources,” Mr Mould said.

Oil from the TEN fields will be produced by FPSO Atta Mills. The TEN Project, a joint venture led by Tullow Oil, is expected to produce about 300 million barrels of oil equivalent (mmboe) over its lifetime (approximately 20 years), 80% of which is oil and 20% gas.

President John Mahama who is currently campaigning in the Western region is expected to join officials of the Petroleum Ministry and Project engineers to officially inaugurate the production process.

The Floating, Production, Storage and Offloading vessel, 350meters long, 56meters wide has a storage capacity of 1.7 million barrels.

The first offloading of oil from the FPSO to a transport tanker is expected to take place weeks after first oil production.

FPSO Atta Mills arrived in Ghana in March 2016. Crude oil will flow from production wells via flowlines and risers to the FPSO. It is a turret-moored FPSO.

The turret on the TEN FPSO is the largest turret currently in existence. MODEC Ghana Ltd operates the FPSO on behalf of the TEN Partners.

Interests in the partnership are: Tullow Oil (47.185%), Kosmos Energy (17%), Anadarko Petroleum Corporation (17%), Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (15%) and PetroSA (3.815%).

The TEN Project lies around 60 kilometers off the coast of the Western Region, Ghana. The Project is developing three offshore oil and gas fields and consists of around 24 wells.

At start-up, 10 wells will be required and these have already been drilled.

According to officials, the field will produce 80,000 barrels of oil per day when it reaches full production. It will also produce an average of 30 MMSCF/D (Million standard Cubic Feet of Gas per day) over the next five years and expected to reach 100 MMSCF/D by 2032.