More oil from Statfjord

Operator Statoil and the other licensees in the Statfjord field in the North Sea have decided to optimise the Statfjord late life project by postponing the depressurisation of the Brent reservoir on the Statfjord field by one year, from 2007 to 2008. This optimisation will boost the oil production by more than seven million new barrels from the Brent reservoir.

Gas exports to the UK in 2007 will remain the same. The gas production and depressurisation of the Statfjord reservoir on the Statfjord field will be maintained.

“Postponing the Brent reservoir depressurisation is important to the field's value creation. This has a considerable positive net present value,” says Lars Christian Bacher, senior vice president for the Tampen business cluster in Statoil.

As a result of this postponement of the Brent reservoir depressurisation the gas production from this reservoir will be somewhat delayed. This will be partly offset by increased gas production from the Statfjord reservoir. The Statfjord reservoir depressurisation will not be changed.

The postponement has minor consequences for the implementation of the Statfjord late life project. Postponement of Brent reservoir depressurisation was to be considered according to the plan for development and operation (PDO) for Statfjord late life. Production experience has given Statoil new information about the reservoir development, which has opened for further optimisation of oil production from the Brent reservoir.

The plans for the Statfjord late life project were approved by the Norwegian parliament on 8 June last year. The approval also includes the plan for installation and operation (PIO) of the Tampen Link pipeline.

Originally designed to handle oil with associated gas, the installations will be modified to handle gas with associated oil.

The licensees in Statfjord are: Statoil (44.34%), ExxonMobil (21.37%), Norske ConocoPhillips (10.33%), Norske Shell (8.55%), ConocoPhillips UK (4.84%), Centrica Resources (4.84%), BP Petroleum Development (4.84%) and Enterprise Oil Norge (0.89%).