Centrica begins drilling at Butch South West well

Faroe Petroleum has announced the spudding of the Centrica-operated Butch South West exploration well 8/10-6S (Faroe 15%).

Butch South West, which is adjacent to the Company’s 2011 Butch discovery, is situated in approximately 65 metres water depth in the Norwegian North Sea, close to significant existing infrastructure with the giant Ula field approximately seven kilometres to the north-west, Tambar approximately ten kilometres to the south west and Gyda approximately 20 kilometres to the south.

The significant Butch Main oil discovery (Faroe 15%) was made in late 2011 and contains a light crude oil in a high quality reservoir, the Upper Jurassic reservoir of the Ula formation. The Butch South West exploration well is located in a separate segment from both the Butch East well, the results of which were announced on 12 May 2014, and the Butch Main well.

The operator is currently working on a development plan for the Butch Main discovery, in parallel with drilling the Butch South West well. If Butch South West is successful the development has the potential to become a stand-alone design, with its own dedicated facility, instead of a sub-sea tie-back to existing nearby infrastructure.
The Butch licence drilling operations are operated by Centrica (40%) using the Maersk Giant jack-up drilling rig, together with the other joint venture partners Suncor Norge AS (30)% and Tullow Oil Norge AS (15)%.

Graham Stewart, Chief Executive of Faroe Petroleum commented: “We are pleased to announce the spudding of the Butch South West exploration well which, if successful, offers the potential to add substantially to the volumes and value of the Butch field, as the adjacent Butch Main field is already on track for near-term development.
“In the near term we also look forward to reporting the results from exploration drilling on the Bue prospect (Faroe 25%) in the Norwegian Sea in close proximity to the recently announced significant Pil oil and gas discovery.”