Shell Oil Co. reports it has drilled the world's deepest offshore well approximately 200 miles from Houston in the Gulf of Mexico.
 
The well was completed at 9,356 feet, or 1.77 miles, below the water's surface in the Silvertop Field at the Perdido Development. Houston-based FMC Technologies Inc. (NYSE: FTI) provided the vertical deepwater tree system used in the well's completion.
 
Russ Ford, Shell's technology vice president for the Americas, says, "Pressing into ever deeper waters shows that the ultra deep is a new frontier for the critical resources to meet the world's future energy needs. This achievement represents a leap forward in applying sophisticated technologies in rugged sea floor terrain with a harsh environment of very high pressures accessible only by remotely operated vehicles. This means not just reaching a new milestone, but forging new ground in technological innovation."
 
The Perdido well is 35% deeper than Shell's 6,950-foot well at Fourier field, which was the previous record-holder. Shell says it plans to drill an even deeper well at the Tobago Field at 9,627 feet.
 
Production from Perdido, which Shell operates on behalf of partners Chevron Corp., San Ramon, Calif., (NYSE: CVX) and BP Plc, London, (NYSE: BP), is expected around 2010. The facility will be capable of handling 130,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day; Shell says to get the oil and gas to market will require 77 miles of oil export pipelines and 107 miles of gas export pipelines.
 
Shell says the technology to develop hydrocarbons in such deep water didn't exist in 1996, when the Perdido lease was sold.