Saudi Aramco has reported Wednesday the start-up of the Karan offshore gas field. The first gas from Karan - the company's first offshore non-associated gas field project - started flowing earlier this month and is being transported by subsea pipeline to the onshore Khursaniyah Gas Plant. The first-phase start-up of Karan marks a significant milestone in the company's gas expansion program, underlining its role as a reliable supplier of energy and its ability to bring giant projects online, both critical to meeting the energy needs of the Kingdom. Discovered in April 2006, Karan is the first non-associated gas field in Saudi territorial waters in the Arabian Gulf. Aramco, which has focused on new gas projects since completing a massive crude expansion plan in 2009, said in its 2010 annual review that Karan should reach a full production capacity of 1.8 billion cfd in April 2013, in time for the peak power demand period of May to September. "When fully operational in 2012, the project will produce 1.8 billion scfd of raw gas," Aramco said in its annual review. Khalid Al-Falih, the CEO of Saudi Aramco, said recently that Saudi Arabia has large reserves of unconventional gas. Offshore facilities at Karan consist of five production platform complexes connected to a main tie-in platform, installed with associated electrical power, communication and state-of-the-art remote monitoring and control facilities for safe and reliable operations from onshore. Detailed design work began in March 2009. The field was discovered when the Karan-6 well drilled into Khuff formations, finding gas in carbonate reservoirs laid down from 200 to 300 million years ago in the Permian and Triassic periods. With Khuff's gross thickness of up to 1,000 feet, Karan's is the thickest Khuff reservoir section ever encountered in Saudi Arabia. The Khuff formation ranges in depth from 10,500-13,700 feet, and Karan lies in medium-depth waters of 40
