Frigg area yields more crude

This find is located about 21 kilometres east of the abandoned Frigg field and 12 kilometres north of Frøy.

“It’s commercially interesting, and we’ve already started looking at prospects for a development linked to nearby oil resources,” says Tom Dreyer, head of infrastructure-led exploration in the North Sea.

The discovery well encountered oil in sandstone of good reservoir quality belonging to the Frigg formation.

“Our starting point has been an old unclarified find in this formation,” explains Dreyer. “An analysis of this, combined with new seismic data, put us quickly on the track of the oil we’ve now proven in Frigg Delta.”

The total potential recoverable volume in this discovery and the nearby Frigg Gamma and Frigg Epsilon reservoirs is in the order or 62-189 million barrels of oil equivalent.

Ocean Vanguard, responsible for the discovery, will now redeploy to the Norwegian Sea to drill an exploration well on the Fløien prospect also operated by StatoilHydro.

In addition to the group with 40%, licensees in production licence 442 covering Frigg Delta are Svenska Petroleum Exploration with 20%, Det Norske with 20%, and Altinex with 20%.

Facts StatoilHydro is operator for PL 442, awarded in 2007, and has completed drilling of 25/2-17 as the first exploration well on this acreage. The discovery has not been tested, but data have been gathered and cores taken. Located in 120 metres of water, the well will now be permanently plugged and abandoned. It was drilled to a vertical depth of 2,171 metres beneath sea level, and terminated in rocks of Lower Eocene age belonging to the Balder formation.