Miraah to produce first steam before end of 2017

Muscat: Glasspoint Solar, a leader in solar enhanced oil recovery (EOR) is planning to produce first steam at the PDO’s Amal oilfield in southern Oman, before the end of 2017 said the President and Chief Executive Officer of the company.
“We are on track to produce the first steam before the end of the next year; right now the construction is head of the schedule,” Rod MacGregor told Times of Oman.
The project will harness the sun’s rays to produce steam which will be used to extract heavy and viscous oil.
The project was awarded to Glasspoint by the Petroleum Development Oman (PDO) July last year. To be named Miraah (mirror in Arabic), the project comes after the success of the pilot project in Amal.
According to MacGregor, Miraah will generate an average of 6,000 tons of solar steam daily for oil production.
Miraah will save 5.6 trillion British Thermal Units (BTUs) of natural gas each year, the amount of gas that could be used to provide residential electricity to the people in Oman.
The use of solar for oil recovery is a long-term strategy to develop PDO’s viscous oil portfolio and reduce consumption of natural gas.
Ben Bierman, Chief Operating Officer of the Glasspoint also confirmed that the project is on track and ahead of schedule.
“Right now everything is looking very good and we are two or three months ahead of the schedule and we hope we can beat that,” Bierman told TOO.
“PDO did a great job preparing the land for us and we managed to get the land ahead of the schedule.
The full-scale project will comprise 36 glasshouses, built in succession and commissioned in modules of four.
Upon completion, the total project area will span three-square kilometres, an area equivalent to more than 360 football pitches.
According to him, Glasspoint started the construction work in March this year.
MacGregor also said that Glasspoint is expecting more projects in Oman and in the region.
“We hope for more projects in Oman and in the region; industry is looking very positively what the PDO has done,” he asserted.
“Usually other national companies follow the steps of the PDO so we are hopeful that we will have more projects in the region,” he added.