After Cancelling Rig Contract, Statoil Makes Minor Discovery at Norwegian field

Government regulatory body, the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate (NPD), has said that Statoil has made a minor gas/oil/condensate discovery on the eastern flank of Statoil's Visund field. 

The discovery was made 140 kilometres offshore from the Norwegian city of Bergen. 

In a statement released on its website, the NPD said the well encountered an oil/gas/condensate column of about 85 metres in the Lunde formation. Of those 85 metres, 40 were assessed to be of moderate to good reservoir quality.

The well, named the Tavros well, was drilled using the Songa Offshore rig, which Statoil had contracted until the 4th of March, 2016. However, last week, Statoil announced that it was suspending the contract four months early due to a lack of viable prospects for the rig.

“We informed the supplier earlier in October about suspending the contract after the rig has completed the drilling operation on the Tavros well on the Visund field," Statoil's head of rig procurements, Tore Aarreberg, said in a statement. "Statoil has hoped for further activity in the remaining contract period, but we now realize that we must cancel the contract, as we have not succeeded in finding more assignments. We regret that we need to cancel the contract before it expires."

The news of Statoil's minor Tavros find comes in the same week Statoil announced that it was cancelling its drilling plans in the Arctic Ocean, offshore Alaska.

The company said that it would exit all 16 of the leases it operates in the Chukchi Sea as well as its stake in 50 leases operated by ConocoPhillips. 

“Since 2008 we have worked to progress our options in Alaska," Statoil's executive vice president for exploration,Tim Dodson, said in a press release on Tuesday. "Solid work has been carried out, but given the current outlook we could not support continued efforts to mature these opportunities."