The $11bn Bul Hanine Field Redevelopment Project is part of a broader scheme to increase the productivity of fields operated by Qatar Petroleum (QP).

Under current plans, the redevelopment project will replace some of Bul Hanine field’s offshore facilities, as well as adding onshore facilities.

The scheme is one of the biggest projects being managed by QP.

The redevelopment plan is expected to increase the field’s production from 40,000 barrels a day (b/d) of oil to 95,000 b/d, as well as extending the field’s life by 25 years.

It will include new offshore central production facilities and a new onshore gas liquids processing facility at Mesaieed. QP also plans to drill about 150 new wells as part of the scheme.

The Bul Hanine field, located 120 kilometres east of Qatar’s coast, is the country’s fourth-largest producing oil asset, its largest offshore oil field, and has already seen decades of production. The field was discovered in 1970 and opened in 1972.

As part of the redevelopment project, oil produced at Bul Hanine will be sent to Halul Island for export, while the estimated 900 million cubic feet a day (cf/d) of sour rich gas will be transported through a new 150km pipeline to Mesaieed for processing. Lean sweet gas will be sent back offshore for compression and injection.

Plans for the field’s redevelopment were approved in May 2014, when oil prices were about $110 a barrel. The collapse in oil prices since then could mean the project will be delayed, or that QP will seek to reduce the cost of its development.

On 8 October, QP awarded US engineering contractor McDermott International an engineering, procurement, construction and installation (EPCI) contract for four wellhead jackets as part of the project.

A wellhead jacket is the steel frame that supports the deck and topsides of an offshore oil platform.

Two of the jackets will be installed in the Bul Hanine field. These have been scheduled for completion in December 2016. The remaining two are scheduled for completion in July 2017.

Qatar Petroleum’s wider plan to improve efficiency at its fields includes the implementation of various well-drilling programmes to increase crude oil reserves at other fields.

These include plans to improve productivity at the onshore Dukhan Field, Qatar’s largest oilfield.