Once Norwegian Sea licence is dropped, Longboat plans to pick it up

Longboat Energy, an emerging full-cycle North Sea E&P company established by the former management team of Faroe Petroleum, is seeking to forge a new group of partners to re-apply for a license in the Norwegian Sea, once it has been abandoned.  

With a 15 per cent non-operated interest, Longboat is Equinor’s partner in the licence PL 939, containing the Egyptian Vulture light oil discovery, which was made by the West Hercules semi-submersible drilling rig. The oil discovery was announced in October 2021, close to infrastructure on the Halten Terrace in the Norwegian Sea.

According to Longboat, the discovery is visible on seismic as a large amplitude anomaly and intensive technical studies have been undertaken to derisk the discovery with a particular focus on seismic interpretation and distribution of areas with good reservoir. As part of this work, ERCE provided an independent assessment of the discovery in a competent person report commissioned by Longboat, which has confirmed the 1C-3C size of the discovery at gross 4-68 mmboe.

For an appraisal well on Egyptian Vulture to be successful, it would need to encounter better reservoir quality than that penetrated by the discovery well. As the Joint Venture participants have been unable to form an aligned view regarding an appraisal well, Longboat claims that they will not be committing to a licence extension as required on 2 March 2023. Therefore, the licence is being relinquished.  

Helge Hammer, Chief Executive of Longboat, commented: “The Egyptian Vulture discovery has significant upside and needs an aligned partnership to be efficiently appraised and progressed to a potential development project. We look forward to creating a new group to take this high-potential asset forward.” 

Moreover, Longboat is looking to form a new group to take the asset forward and rather than take over the existing licence, which would involve escalating license fees, will seek to re-apply for the acreage in the forthcoming licence round with awards due in January 2024.