Mobil Replaced 165 Percent of Oil and Gas Reserves in 1998
21 January 1999
Mobil Replaced 165 Percent of Oil and Gas Reserves in 1998
FAIRFAX, Va.--Jan. 20, 1999--Mobil Corp. announced Wednesday that it replaced 165 percent of its oil and gas production with new proved reserves in 1998.Over the past three years, the company has replaced, on average, 148 percent of its production. Excluding purchases and sales, replacement for 1998 reached 169 percent at an average cost of finding and developing of about $3.70 per barrel, and over the last three years about 130 percent of production was replaced at an average cost of about $4.20 per barrel.
Proved reserves at year-end were 7,585 million barrels of oil equivalent (MMBOE), up 408 MMBOE from 1997. Production was 625 MMBOE for 1998 resulting in a reserves to production ratio (reserve life) of just over 12 years.
Additions to proved reserves totaled 1,033 MMBOE including 641 MMBOE from exploration, extensions and other additions, 417 MMBOE from revisions to ongoing projects, less 25 MMBOE from purchases and sales.
The 641 MMBOE from extensions, discoveries and other additions included about 480 MMBOE for the Cerro Negro heavy oil project in Venezuela, consistent with approval of the upgrader and completion of the project financing, plus additions in Eastern Canada, West Africa, United States, South America and Kazakhstan.
The 417 MMBOE from revisions included about 140 MMBOE in the US and about 275 MMBOE in international operations.
In the US, 60 MMBOE were added as a result of Mobil's swap of certain assets in the central and western Gulf of Mexico shelf to Arco for their onshore California interests; about 120 MMBOE were added due to expanded operations at Aera (Mobil's California heavy oil joint venture with Shell) and better than anticipated performance and improved recovery in other existing fields; and about 40 MMBOE of downward reserve revisions were incurred due to technical reassessments of various fields in the shallow water Gulf of Mexico and other areas.
Internationally, about 275 MMBOE were added primarily due to upward revisions to a number of fields in Nigeria, the Zafiro field in Equatorial Guinea and various fields in Europe, less the write-off of about 50 MMBOE of reserves at the Madura field in Indonesia due to a delay in development.
Mobil's proved reserves represent just under 30 percent of the total resource inventory which now totals about 28 billion barrels of oil equivalent, up about 3 billion BOE for the year. Major increases to resources this year came from the Canadian oil sands project and the enhanced gas utilization project in Qatar.
For more news and information about Mobil, please see us on the World Wide Web at www.mobil.com.
