Chevron’s Water Injection to Boost Oil, Natural Gas Recovery at Gulf Facilities

Chevron Corp. began water injection operations to increase oil and natural gas recovery at its Jack/St. Malo and Tahiti deepwater facilities in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico. Chevron holds a 51% working interest in the St. Malo field and a 58% working interest in its Tahiti facility, serving as operator for both locations.

The company achieved first water injection in the St. Malo field—a waterflood project in the deepwater Wilcox trend. The project was delivered under budget, adding water injection facilities, two new production wells, and two new injection wells. It is projected to add approximately 175 million barrels of oil equivalent to St. Malo field’s gross ultimate recovery.

The Jack/St. Malo facility and field are located approximately 280 miles offshore New Orleans, LA, in about 7,000 feet of water. Since production began in 2014, Jack and St. Malo have produced nearly 400 million gross barrels of oil equivalent.

Jack/St. Malo offshore facility; Image Credits: Chevron

At the Tahiti location, Chevron started injecting water into its first Gulf producer-to-injector conversion wells. The company installed a new water injection manifold and 20,000 feet of flexible water injection flowline. This facility is located approximately 190 miles south of New Orleans in around 4,100 feet of water. With operations beginning in 2009, the Tahiti facility exceeded 500 million gross barrels of oil-equivalent cumulative production.

“Delivery of these two projects maximizes returns from our existing resource base and contributes toward growing our production to 300,000 net barrels of oil equivalent per day in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico by 2026,” said Bruce Niemeyer, President of Chevron Americas Exploration & Production. “These achievements follow the recent production startup at our high-pressure Anchor field, reinforcing Chevron’s position in technological delivery and project execution in the Gulf.”

Chevron will study advanced drilling, completion, and production technologies to deploy during future development phases at Tahiti and Jack/St. Malo, with the goal to further increase oil and natural gas recovery from these sites.

Chevron’s Oil & Gas News

In late August 2024, Chevron Australia New Ventures was granted a greenhouse gas (GHG) assessment permit offshore Onslow, Western Australia. The G-18-AP permit covers an approximate area of 8,467 km² with water depths of 50 - 1,100 meters. The permitted area will be evaluated as a hub to store third-party emissions, including those from Chevron-operated LNG assets.

Also in August, Chevron started oil and natural gas production at its deepwater asset in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico—the Anchor project. The Anchor—a semi-submersible FPU—features a design capacity of 75,000 gross barrels of oil per day and 28 million gross cubic feet of natural gas per day. The site has reservoir depths up to 34,000 feet below sea-level, and production is aided by high-pressure technology rated up to 20,000 psi.

Development includes seven subsea wells connected to the Anchor FPU, located in the Green Canyon approximately 140 miles offshore Louisiana, in water depths of about 5,000 feet. It is designed as an all-electric facility with electric motors and electronic controls to minimize carbon emissions. In addition, the FPU uses waste heat and vapor recovery units and existing pipelines to transport oil and natural gas to U.S. Gulf Coast markets. The site contains up to 440 million barrels of oil equivalent in estimated recoverable resources.