HOUSTON, Aug. 9 (UPI) -- Drilling contractor Baker Hughes announced it received an award from Russian energy company Lukoil to drill 23 wells at an oil field in southeast Iraq.
Baker Hughes last year opened a 30-acre operations base in the port city of Basra to service its work in the Iraqi oil and natural gas sector. The company said it has a deal in hand from Russian oil company Lukoil to drill 23 wells in the West Qurna field in the region.
"Under the terms of the contract, Baker Hughes will provide engineering and project management for the turnkey drilling and completions scope of the project," the company said in a statement. The terms of the deal weren't disclosed.
Revisions of estimated reserves in Iraq led the country's oil minister to say in October that there were around 143 billion barrels of oil in Iraq.
Full-scale production at the southern oil field is scheduled for the end of 2012. The field should reach a peak production rate of 1.8 million barrels per day by 2017 and sustain that level for more than a decade.
Lukoil is developing fields in the region alongside Norwegian energy company Statoil.
