Solomon Announces the Release of Upstream New Projects OpEx Estimator

Today, oil and gas companies face pressure to develop new resources while keeping costs low. Leveraging Solomon’s Comparative Performance Analysis methodology and proprietary, non-public data from more than 5,000 fields worldwide, the OpEx Estimator helps operators evaluate cost optimization areas based on P10, P50 and P90 resources before deciding to move forward with a project.

Operators can get a picture of what the major cost categories will look like and what the major performance drivers are, including surface repair, maintenance and labor, transportation, energy, well servicing, chemical, and field general and administrative costs.

“OpEx for field development projects today accounts for up to 50% of the accumulated cost of producing a barrel of oil,” Per H. Gren, Senior Consultant with Solomon, said. “OpEx is much more difficult to assess because the costs are spread out over several decades and are based on many assumptions. As fields and infrastructure mature, maintenance cost also can rise higher than initial estimates.”

While tools that estimate capital expenditures (CapEx) are widely available in the market, tools that calculate OpEx are limited to estimating OpEx as a percent allocation for a proposed CapEx budget. “Solomon utilized its more than 30 years of production operation benchmarking to develop the OpEx Estimator, which will give our clients the standardized data and trustworthy performance assessment they need,” Gren said.