Many people turned up at the Lofoten Cultural Centre to discuss petroleum recovery off the coast of Nordland county. Helge Lund (left) presented StatoilHydro's perspective. (Photo: Svein Are Enes)
"We believe that it will be perfectly possible to bring ashore any finds in the Nordland VI and VII blocks," said Mr Lund. "Our surveys underpin this."
The chief executive noted that bringing finds via a pipeline to an onshore facility was conditional on this being technically and economically viable.
Big spin-offs
StatoilHydro would prefer to develop finds off the coast of Nordland county with small facilities on the seabed which would not hinder fishing.
Helge Lund focused on practical solutions for coexistence when he addressed the public meeting in Svolvær on oil recovery off the Lofoten Islands. (Photo: Svein Are Enes)
"Whatever solution we choose it will be natural for us to establish a local operations organisation and a new local oil spill response base," said Mr Lund.
He reminded the audience of the positive spin-offs which the Snøhvit development has given to Hammerfest and which Ormen Lange has provided to Aukra and maintained that petroleum activity off Lofoten will offer similar opportunities.
Invitation to local firms
"I cannot promise a specific number of jobs or the size of local income. But we will use our experience and expertise to ensure that local business and industry gets the greatest part of the value created," stated Mr Lund.
During the public meeting in the Lofoten Cultural Centre he talked about StatoilHydro's new strategy for maintenance and modifications contracts. The elements most relevant to the activity in northern Norway are:
- Suppliers who will get contracts must have a local office with engineering capacity close to StatoilHydro's operations entities.
- StatoilHydro will reduce the size of some contracts to open up for deliveries from smaller firms.
- It will also be possible for smaller companies to join together in an alliance and submit tenders collectively.
"This is an important industrial response to the expectations regarding local spin-offs," said Mr Lund. "It's now up to companies up in the north to find ways of collaborating so that you can compete for these contracts."
Limiting seismic data
The chief executive also tried to reassure the fishermen since there has been a lot of debate about gathering seismic data.
"We see the need for a stricter regulation of the seismic work in this area compared with other regions," he said.
He believes that the gathering of seismic data should be concentrated with regard to the number of players, period of time and acreage. In addition, several years should pass between each time that seismic data is gathered from the same area.
"If it is not possible to reach agreement through such measures, various compensatory schemes should also be considered," Mr Lund told the meeting.