TotalFinaElf Receives Award

Total Fina Elf.
31 January 2003


             TotalFinaElf Receives OTC 2003 Award for the Excellence 
                            of its Offshore Expertise


Paris, January 31, 2003 - TotalFinaElf is to receive the prestigious
Distinguished Achievement Award for Girassol, the company's deep water
development project in Angola, at the 2003 Offshore Technology Conference (OTC),
to be held this May in Houston. The much-coveted award is presented each year to
a Company, Organization or Institution in recognition of outstanding work or
service on a major project which has contributed to the advancement of offshore
technology.

Founded in 1969, OTC is the world's foremost conference for exploration and
production professionals. The annual event draws some 50,000 visitors from more
than 120 countries.

'We are very honored to receive this award,' says Christophe de Margerie,
President, Exploration and Production, who will accept the award on behalf of
TotalFinaElf. 'Girassol set a number of deep offshore records, such as the
installation of riser towers some 1,300 meters high, laying out a sub-sea
collection network in 1,400 meters of water and carrying out hundreds of sub-sea
connections without human intervention. It's a stepping stone in innovation for
the industry. We are a leader in deepwater projects, and the knowledge we
acquired is being applied to other developments worldwide. This achievement has
only been possible thanks to the professionalism of TotalFinaElf's employees and
its contractors, who brought to the project indispensable technical expertise
and thereby contributed to the success of the development.'

At a water depth of 1,400 meters, Girassol is also Africa's first deepwater
development. Following first production in December 2001, Girassol rapidly
reached its current plateau of 200,000 barrels of oil per day and today
comprises 23 of the 39 sub-sea wells planned in the development. At a total
investment of $2.8 billion, this project was made possible by a great number of
technological innovations, such as: 1,300-meter-long thermally insulated,
tensioned riser towers and submerged mid-water steel loading lines. The Floating
Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) vessel has a storage capacity of 2
million barrels of oil, making it the largest of its kind in this water depth.

Girassol is the first of the thirteen discoveries made by TotalFinaElf on
Angola's Block 17 in which Sonangol is the concessionary. TotalFinaElf operates
the block with a 40% interest. The other partners are Esso Exploration Angola
(20%), BP (16.67%), Statoil (13.33%) and Norsk Hydro (10%).

The key driver behind TotalFinaElf's policy of dynamic growth is its ongoing
commitment to research, not just in offshore technology but in Geosciences and
treatment processes, to improve conventional development projects as well as
prepare for new technological challenges.

With this development, TotalFinaElf has demonstrated its mastery of deepwater
technologies and its capabilities as one of the world's foremost oil companies.
The project is the first, successful step in a series of future deepwater
developments in Angola, the Congo and Nigeria that will consolidate the
Company's position as a leading deep offshore operator in Africa.


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