Abstract

The South Furious field located offshore North Sabah 205 km northeast of Labuan Island, was discovered in 1974. The field came on stream in December 1979 and has been developed from a 15 slot (SFDP-A) platform in the Eastern Area and a 4-slot (SFJT-B) jacket in the Central Area. The field carries an expectation STOIIP of 548 MMstb, with a cumulative production of some 27 MMstb by 1.1.98. Peak oil production of 9000 bopd was reached during 1981 and 1982 and subsequently fluctuated between 2000 and 6000 bopd. Solution gas drive is the main producing drive mechanism. The main challenges are identifying and developing additional reserves within the field that contains a recovery factor of below 10%.

Seismic acquisition history spans a time range of more than 35 years (1960 to 1996), with the first digital 2D recording carried out in 1976. In 1977 a 2D Ultra High Resolution survey was acquired which, in 1986, was processed to a pseudo-3D grid. In 1996 a 182 km² 3D survey was shot, covering both the South Furious field and the Barton field to the northeast.

The complex structural setting of the South Furious field, the discontinuous nature of the Middle Miocene reservoir sands and the poor seismic data have made it difficult to generate a subsurface model. With the gradual increase in seismic quality through time, however, and the application of state-of-the-art interpretation tools, the structural complex field could be unraveled, which resulted in identifying new well targets within the Greater South Furious area. These new Stage IVA and IVC reservoirs were to be tested/developed by the South Furious 28 appraisal/development well.

SF-28 was spudded on August 21″, 1998 and produced both disappointment and encouragement. Some 70 ft of net oil sand at main objective Stage IVA reservoir level were encountered, representing only 10% of the expected total Stage IVA gross reservoir sand footage. The discovery of a further 70 ft of net oil sand at shallower and so far untested Stage IVC sequence came as a surprise, and promises a potential Exploration play within the region.