Low Production And Lifting, SKK Migas Says Indonesia Loses 20,000 Barrels Of Oil Per Day

Illustration. (Photo: Doc. Antara)

JAKARTA - Head of the Special Task Force for Upstream Oil and Gas (SKK Migas) Dwi Soetjipto revealed that Indonesia's oil and gas (oil and gas) production and lifting are still constrained by low entry points in 2022 due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. He admitted, with the low entry point, Indonesia lost 20,000 barrels of oil per day (BOPD).

"Mostly we are still hit with very low entry point constraints in 2022, due to the impact of the pandemic in 2021. So we lost there around 20 thousand barrels of oil per day," he explained at a press conference on the Performance of SKK Migas in the first quarter of 2022, Friday 22 April.

In his presentation, he revealed that oil lifting during January to March 2022 averaged 611.7 thousand barrels per day (bopd), lower than the target in the 2022 State Revenue and Expenditure Budget (APBN) of 703 thousand BOPD.

Meanwhile for gas lifting, the average for the first quarter was still at 5,321 million standard cubic feet per day (MMSCFD), lower than the target of 5,800 MMSCFD.

Previously, in January 2021 there was a decrease in lifting to 652 bopd due to declines, pipe leaks, and unplanned shutdowns at several oil drilling sites in Indonesia.

He detailed that in early 2021, there were a number of unplanned shutdowns, such as at Husky-CNOOCK Madura Limited (HCML) and Medco Natuna. Meanwhile, Pertamina Hulu Energi Offshore North West Java (PHE ONWJ) experienced a pipe leak in May 2021.

Not only that, there was also a cessation of operations at PHE ONWJ, which was followed by PT Pertamina Hulu Rokan (PHR) and Exxon Mobil Cepu Limited (EMCL) due to power failures. As a result, oil production in January 2022 fell to 616,000 BOPD.

"The lightning rod's PHR didn't work. Not to mention the EMCL which caught fire because the cable connection caught fire, so this is an unplanned shutdown that happened so it dropped again at 616," he added.

Meanwhile, in February and March there was an increase in lifting, but the problem was that the EMCL decreased due to landslides, causing the pipe to bend.

"There are things that are dangerous, so we stop. We lost 11,000 production in Cepu. Our main opponent is the unplanned shutdown," concluded Dwi.