Norway OKs Aker BP’s plan for Norwegian Sea field development

Norwegian Ministry of Petroleum and Energy has approved Aker BP’s plan for development and operation of the Ærfugl field located in the Norwegian Sea. 

Aker BP submitted the plan to the Norwegian authorities for the Ærfugl field together with two other plans, for the Valhall Flank West and Skogul, in December 2017. The field was previously known as Snad.

The Ærfugl field, including Snadd Outer, is a unique gas condensate field, nearly 60 km long and just 2-3 km wide, situated close to the Aker BP-operated Skarv FPSO, approximately 210 km west of Sandnessjøen.

The development involves an investment of approximately NOK 8.5 billion ($1.1 billion). Production is expected to start in 4Q 2020 and expected production time is 15 years.

Minister of Petroleum and Energy, Terje Søviknes, noted on Friday that this was his fifth development to be approved in two weeks time.

The Ærfugl PDO covers the full-field development and includes the resources in both the Ærfugl and Snadd Outer fields which are planned to be developed in two phases. The first phase includes three new production wells in the southern part of the field tied into the Skarv FPSO via a trace heated pipe-in-pipe flowline, in addition to the existing A-1 Hwell.

The second phase is subject to further maturation, but the reference case includes two additional wells in the northern part of the field and one in Snadd Outer also tied into the Skarv FPSO with an estimated production start late 2023. Other alternatives will be looked at to select the optimized concept.

The total remaining reserves for the full-field development are estimated at approximately 275 million barrels of oil equivalents.

Aker BP has already hired Subsea 7 and Aker Solutions as subsea contractors for the development.

The partners in the field are Aker BP (operator, 23,835 pct), Statoil Petroleum (36,165 pct), DEA Norge (28.0825 pct) And PGNiG Upstream Norway (11.9175 pct).

Offshore Energy Today Staff