Utgard Spending in Sight
Thursday 2 June 2016
Statoil is reportedly looking to invest between Nkr4 billion and Nkr4.5 billion ($478 million and $538 million) in development of the Utgard discovery straddling the Norway and UK maritime border in the North Sea.
It would mark one of only a few field developments set to move forward this year in the present low oil price environment, with Dea’s Zidane in the Norwegian Sea also on the radar screen.
Statoil aims to develop Utgard - formerly named Alfa Sentral - as a subsea tieback to the Sleipner T platform, with a control cable hooked up to Sleipner A, in an effort to further develop the Sleipner area and prolong its producing lifetime towards 2030.
The project will involve two wells, a 20-kilometre pipeline and modifications at Sleipner to tap Utgard’s estimated 60 million barrels of oil equivalent in recoverable resources, though a third well could be drilled at a later date.
It is planned to install a subsea template with four well slots and manifold, drill two wells and lay flowlines and control cables at the field in the 2018-to-2019 timeframe, according to a preliminary schedule disclosed in the document.
This means that a semi-submersible rig will be required for drilling and completion of the wells, offering another rare contract opportunity for work-starved rig contractors hit by a market slump.