Petrobras announced Friday it has started producing oil and natural gas through the P-67 floating, production, storage and offloading unit (FPSO), in the deepwater Lula Norte area, in the pre-salt of Santos Basin offshore Brazil.

The FPSO is located approximately 260 kilometers off Rio de Janeirot, at a water depth of 2,130 meters. With capacity to process up to 150,000 barrels of oil and 6 million cubic meters of natural gas per day, it will produce through nine production wells, in addition to being interconnected to its injection wells. Produced oil will be transported by lifting vessels, while gas will be transported via pipeline.

P-67 is the ninth unit set up in the BM-S-11 block operated by Petrobras (65%) in partnership with Shell Brasil Petróleo Ltda. (25%) and Petrogal Brasil S.A.(10%), and is the third in a series of standardized vessels built for the consortium including P-66 (Lula Sul) and P-69 (Lula Extremo Sul).

Other platforms operating in the block are FPSO Cidade de Angra dos Reis (Lula Pilot), FPSO Cidade de Paraty (Lula Nordeste Pilot), FPSO Cidade de Mangaratiba (Iracema Sul), FPSO Cidade de Itaguaí (Iracema Norte), FPSO Cidade de Maricá (Lula Alto) and FPSO Cidade de Saquarema (Lula Central).

Discovered in 2006, Lula is the largest producing field in Brazil and accounts for 30 percent of the country’s oil and gas production. The Lula and Cernambi reservoirs are expected to reach 1 million barrels of oil produced daily in 2019, less than a decade after the start of commercial production in October 2010.