Türkiye’s Fatih drill vessel has started operations at its new location at the Göktepe-2 well in the Sakarya Gas Field in the Black Sea, Energy and Natural Resources Minister Alparslan Bayraktar said Thursday.
"Türkiye is simultaneously ramping up production and exploring new fields," Bayraktar said in a post on X, formerly Twitter.
"We are setting sail for new discoveries in the Black Sea," the minister noted.
Bayraktar recently hinted at a potential discovery of an oil reserve in the Black Sea, expressing hope that news on a new find would be shared with the public soon.
"We have ongoing studies in the Black Sea that we believe show signs of oil," he said at the time highlighting that exploration and drilling activities were proceeding rapidly in the Black Sea.
The Sakarya gas field off the northwestern Zonguldak province was gradually discovered in August 2020.
The output there has reached 4.5 million cubic meters (mcm) per day, enough to meet the needs of 1.8 million homes, since Türkiye started pumping gas into the national grid through a pipeline linked to an onshore processing facility more than a year ago.
Although boosting exploration efforts, Türkiye is highly dependent on imports to cover its energy needs, which left it vulnerable to rising costs that surged following Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Over the years, it ramped up its hydrocarbon explorations in the Black Sea and the Eastern Mediterranean to curb external dependence. The Black Sea output is aimed to be lifted first to 10 mcm before reaching 40 mcm in the final phase.
Apart from the ongoing explorations on the northern coast, Türkiye has also expedited the production in the Gabar field in the southeastern Şırnak province, where the officials aim to see the output elevated to 100,000 barrels per day (bpd) by the end of the year. The current production volume is said to have exceeded 40,000 bpd.
The Fatih drill ship boasts a length of 229 meters (751,31 feet) and a width of 36 meters. Its gross tonnage weighs in at 51,283.
Fatih is the country’s first drill vessel and joined the fleet of the Turkish Petroleum Corporation (TPAO) in 2017. On July 20, 2020, it conducted its first drilling expedition in the Black Sea. Aug. 21 marked its first success story following a month of work at the Tuna-1 location off the coast of Zonguldak in the Black Sea region.
Türkiye has several ships for exploration and drilling activities in its territorial waters. Drill ships Fatih, Yavuz, Kanuni and Abdülhamid Han, along with seismic exploration vessels Barbaros Hayrettin Paşa and MTA Oruç Reis, are active in the country’s oil and gas exploration projects.