European Commission OKs Shell’s North Sea asset sale

The European Commission has given its clearance for the Shell’s sale of the UK North Sea assets to Chrysaor.

As previously reported, Shell in January 2017 agreed to sell “a package” its of UK North Sea assets to Chrysaor for a fee of up to $3.8 billion.

Chrysaor, the UK oil and gas independent, will buy Shell’s interests in Beryl, Bressay, Buzzard, Elgin-Franklin, Erskine, Everest, the Greater Armada cluster, J Block, Lomond, plus a 10% stake in Schiehallion.

In a statement on Friday, the European Commision said it had approved “under the EU Merger Regulation the acquisition of sole control over the Northern North Sea petroleum business of the Shell Group, of the Netherlands, by Chrysaor Holdings Limited, part of EIG Global Energy Partners, of the US.”

The target assets consist of Shell’s Northern North Sea asset portfolio, including shareholdings in a number of oil fields and infrastructure and the relevant licences.

Chrysaor develops and commercializes oil and gas incremental resources. EIG is a global investment fund specializing in energy and energy-related infrastructure.

“The Commission concluded that the proposed acquisition would raise no competition concerns given the very limited overlap between the companies’ activities and the presence of strong competitors,” the commission said.