Field Development Plan — Chinook

Generated by the worldenergydata field-development playbook (epic #567). Recommendation is heuristic (Concept Select / FEL-1 fidelity), not a sanctioned design.

Engineering rationale

Chinook is a Lower Tertiary Wilcox field in ~2690 m of water developed jointly with neighboring Cascade by tying subsea wet-tree wells back ~24 km (15 mi) to the shared BW Pioneer FPSO, the first FPSO ever to operate in the US Gulf of Mexico (moored over the Cascade area). With no nearby pipeline infrastructure and ultra-deep water, a disconnectable internal-turret FPSO with shuttle-tanker offloading was selected over a fixed host. The long subsea tiebacks of waxy, low-GOR Wilcox crude create severe flow-assurance constraints (cooldown limits if flow stops beyond ~12 hours), and the wells use free-standing hybrid risers and seabed boosting; operatorship passed from Petrobras to Murphy Oil, which also bought the FPSO in 2025. Notable: Tied to BW Pioneer, the first FPSO deployed in the US Gulf of Mexico.

Field parameters

Water depth
2690.0 m
Concept
subsea_tieback
Fluid
oil
Operator
Murphy Oil (Murphy Exploration & Production / MP GOM; Petrobras America partner)
Wells
2
Plateau
Tieback
24.0 km
First oil
2012

Recommended concept shortlist

ConceptScoreTreesRationale / flags
subsea_tieback ★0.847wethost within 60 km with spare capacity
subsea_to_shore0.734wet
fpso0.688wethurricane regime: FPSO needs a disconnectable turret
flng0.622wet

★ = the concept actually selected for this field (where known).

Economics & execution (engine estimate)

Dev system
subsea20
Est. CAPEX
474.0 $MM
Est. NPV
Install vessels
8
Max crane
5000.0 t
Hardware
RJ-08-HYD-15K

As built (actuals)

Host
BW Pioneer FPSO
Play
Lower Tertiary / Wilcox
First oil
2012
BSEE code
WR469
Confidence
high

Architecture & layout (subsea_tieback)

Subsea architecture — Chinook flowline umbilical jumper control jumper control export Export Existing Host (tieback) Manifold 1 XT 1 XT 2
Subsea architecture block diagram
Field layout — Chinook Subsea manifold Manifold 1 Subsea tree (wet XT) XT 1 Subsea tree (wet XT) XT 2 Existing host (tieback) Existing Host (tieback) Export Export N 1 km
Plan-view field layout (to scale)

Sources: SubseaIQ field catalog (~2014) + BSEE + curated vessel/ subsea catalogs. Schematics are deterministic, generated from the field concept.