Two Producing Wells Added to Ayatsil Field

Mexico’s state oil company PEMEX has announced the launch of an additional two producing wells at the Ayatsil shallow-water field. 

Assignment A-0032-M-Ayatsil is located off the coast of Campeche in the Gulf of Mexico, around 120km from Ciudad del Carmen, and borders PEMEX’s top-producing Ku-Maloob-Zaap (KMZ) cluster. According to a video uploaded to Twitter by PEMEX CEO Octavio Romero, the two wells will increase the field's production by 7Mb/d bringing the total number of wells active at Ayatsil from 22 to 24. 

Speaking from the Campeche platform of the Ayatsil field, Romero pointed to the neighboring KMZ platforms directly behind him, as well as infrastructure belonging to Cantarell further in the distance, as he noted the immense wealth this region has yielded for the benefit of Mexico as a shallow-water hub. Romero also explained that, due to certain characteristics of the field, it was necessary to introduce a pump to help extract the heavy crude: "The characteristics of this field are very special since we are dealing with very heavy, very viscous crude, which lacks the energy required to escape due to its very low gas content. Therefore, when the well is drilled, a pump needs to be placed at the bottom to bring the crude up to the surface.”

The modification to Ayatsil’s development plan, recently approved by CNH, foresees a 68 percent investment increase in the field with the aim of eventually boosting production by 50 percent. The plan includes bringing the total number of active wells up to 40, the construction of two new pipelines and other additional infrastructure, as well as 13 major and 2,529 minor repairs to existing infrastructure. To this end, PEMEX’s E&P arm has designated MX$19.3 billion (US$948.3 million) for Ayatsil’s further development out of its proposed 2023 budget of US$441 billion (US$21.66 billion) allocated by the finance ministry.

Ayatsil was discovered in 2007 and entered production in 2015. As the largest heavy oil discovery of its time and PEMEX’s eighth-largest assignment by sea surface area, Ayatsil is expected to replace some of the declining production from Cantarell and KMZ. Currently, Ayatsil is Mexico's third largest field in terms of 3P reserves with 1.41 Billion boe of extra-heavy crude, of which 1.1Mboe is 2P reserves and 938MMboe of 1P. As of June 2022, Ayatsil was the fourth-highest producing field in PEMEX's upstream portfolio, contributing an output of 88Mb/d, trailing only Maloob’s 273Mb/d, Zaap’s 241Mb/d and Xanab’s 90Mb/d. Once these modifications are implemented, Ayatsil’s production is forecasted to peak at around 120Mb/d.