Minister of Petroleum and Energy Odd Roger Enoksen opened a new exhibition on Wednesday featuring the thrilling Ormen Lange gas development. The exhibition is being held in the Norwegian Petroleum Museum in Stavanger.
At the opening of the exhibition Ormen Lange project director, Hydro's Tom Røtjer, briefed partipants about the major gas development project on the Ormen Lange field coming on stream next year.
"It's especially pleasing to be responsible for a project that is being rewarded with its own exhibition even before it's been completed! First and foremost, I would like to congratulate the museum. Once again it has demonstrated its ability to portray the scale of, and the challenges faced by Norway's oil industry in a very convincing way," he said.
The Ormen Lange exhibition is being unveiled almost a year before the field comes on stream. It provides a good example of how museums do not need to look back in time, but can also reflect contemporary technological solutions and illustrate what the future has in store.
The exhibition features a large-scale model of the development concept and a virtual reality simulator. The prize-winning film on Ormen Lange "The Traveller", presented by Ian Wright of TV's Lonely Planet series, is being shown in a state-of- the-art movie theater. The public can also play the arcade game "Crazy Engineering" with its Ormen Lange theme.
"Ormen Lange is primarily an impressive joint project involving the partners, the supplier industry, the local community, academia and the authorities," Røtjer said.
The Ormen Lange development was adopted by the Storting in 2004 and is the biggest-ever single investment in Norway.
"All the project milestones reached so far have been exactly as planned. We are now well positioned to deliver gas to the UK next year, in line with the time and budget limits set," added Røtjer.
This was Odd Roger Enoksen's first visit to the petroleum museum in Stavanger. In his address, he praised the museum for enabling Norway's oil history to be communicated so well. He also emphasized how important the Ormen Lange development is for the country.
The exhibition was developed by the Norwegian Petroleum Museum in collaboration with Hydro, Norske Shell, Det Norske Veritas and Oceaneering.