Fieldwood Energy's New oil reserves mean new jobs for Lafayette

Houston-based Fieldwood Energy has paid $750 million cash to buy SandRidge Energy Inc.’s Gulf of Mexico oil reserves and Gulf Coast business unit.

CEO Matt McCarroll told The Daily Advertiser the Dec. 1 purchase, announced Tuesday, would mean additional jobs in Fieldwood’s Lafayette office.

“We expect a modest increase in staffing associated with our Lafayette office as we integrate our operations and personnel,” said Lafayette native McCarroll by email. “Our employees in Lafayette as well as our contractors and vendors in the Lafayette area are critical to our continued success. The combined Fieldwood and SandRidge businesses will spend over $1 billion a year on operations in the Gulf of Mexico. A significant amount of that spending is related to Lafayette-area businesses.”

This is the second big buy for McCarroll in less than a year. Last summer, Fieldwood bought Apache Corp.’s Gulf of Mexico shelf business for $3.75 billion, which included 1.9 million acres and more than 600 Gulf platforms.

When McCarroll bought Apache, he hired Apache’s 435 offshore workers and 85 office employees. Of that number, 278 were from Lafayette.

A Netherland, Sewell & Associates reserve report said the reserves Houston-based Fieldwood purchased include 57.2 million barrels of oil equivalent (Mmboe) with probable reserves of 11.4 Mmboe and 9 Mmboe possible reserves. Oklahoma-based SandRidge also operates the deepwater Bullwinkle field and associated platform in about 1,350 feet of water. Just prior to the sale, SandRidge predicted 26 percent growth for 2014.

As part of the deal with Fieldwood, SandRidge will retain a 2 percent overriding royalty interest in two identified exploration prospects.

According to a statement issued by McCarroll, Fieldwood obtained underwritten committed financing for the transaction from Citigroup Global Markets Inc., J.P. Morgan, Deutsche Bank AG New York Branch, BofA Merrill Lynch and Goldman Sachs Bank USA.

“The acquisition adds further geographic and geologic diversity by expanding our business to include an onshore Gulf Coast division as well as the deepwater Bullwinkle,” McCarroll said Tuesday.

“Furthermore, the acquired assets add a number of near-term, high-quality drilling prospects to our existing drilling inventory.”