Unocal to embark on West Seno project

Unocal to embark on West Seno project

SINGAPORE: Unocal Corp. is set to embark on the second part of
a two-phase West Seno oil and gas development project offshore
East Kalimantan by early next year, said Andrew Buglass, a senior
executive at Unocal Asia-Pacific Ventures Ltd.

Unocal will "start the process (of arranging the award of an
engineering and procurement contract) in earnest early next
year," Buglass said Tuesday.

Completion of the second and last phase of West Seno
development is expected by 2005, he said, with oil production
peaking at 60,000 barrels a day.

By Phase Two of West Seno development, gas output should peak
at 150 million cubic feet a day, he added.

Buglass, vice president of Unocal's Asian project finance, was
speaking on the sidelines of a power financing conference in
Singapore.

The US$1-billion West Seno project in the Makassar Straits,
Unocal's first deepwater project in Indonesia, is expected to
yield 40,000 b/d of oil "shortly," Buglass said, declining to
give an exact timeframe.

Unocal estimates reserves of around 300 million barrels of oil
equivalent in its West Seno field, which it operates with a 90
percent interest. Its partner in West Seno, Indonesia's
Pertamina, holds the remaining 10 percent. -- Dow Jones