On 16 December, the Norwegian government approved Statoil’s plans for improved oil recovery (IOR) from the Tordis field in the North Sea.
New technology will allow the Tordis IOR project to boost recovery by around 35 million barrels of oil. This represents an increase in the recovery factor from 49 to 55 per cent.
“Tordis IOR represents an important step forward for technical solutions in this area,” says project manager Hans Kristiansen.
“The project will be the first in the world to adopt full-scale subsea separation.”
This technology also represents a significant contribution to improving recovery from smaller discoveries, fields in deeper water and reservoirs remote from fixed installations.
In addition, the Tordis IOR development will help to achieve a significant reduction in discharges of produced water to the sea.
A contract worth some NOK 625 million, including options, has earlier been awarded by Statoil to Kongsberg FMC for construction of a subsea separation station for the project.
Stolt Offshore has this week been given the job of carrying out marine operations worth some NOK 200 million on the field.
And the separation station is due to be lifted into place by Saipem UK in 2007 under a contract worth some NOK 50 million.
Investment in the project is estimated at roughly NOK 2 billion.
A project reserve included to ensure development of the necessary technology has boosted the cost estimate compared with the plan for development and operation submitted in October.
Tordis is produced through subsea installations tied back to the Gullfaks C platform operated by Statoil.
Plans call for IOR through low-pressure production to start in the autumn of 2006, while the subsea separation system is due to come on stream in October 2007.