UK Junior Farms Out To Equinor In North Sea
UK oil and gas junior Soliton Resources announced on July 26 it had farmed out a stake in its one and only licence to Norway’s state giant Equinor.
Under the deal, Equinor will receive an 85% stake in Soliton’s P2390 licence in the UK Central North Sea, while also assuming its operatorship. As operator, it will carry out an initial work programme to improve the quality of existing 3D seismic data.
The licence contains the Isolde oil and gas prospect, which according to Soliton is “a shallow, low risk and potentially sizeable exploration target that has historically been overlooked, partially as a result of seismic imaging limitations on legacy 3D data.”
Based on the results of the seismic work, Equinor will decide whether to drill an exploration well targeting Isolde. The Norwegian firm will refund Soliton’s licence costs to date and, if a discovery is made, will continue covering its expenses, including for appraisal work, until a decision is made on development.
“I am delighted to announced that Equinor is joining Soliton to progress the exploration of the Isolde prospect,” Soliton’s managing director Graham Goffey said. “The high level of industry interest in what proved to be a particularly competitive farmout process is a clear indication of the merits of the Isolde prospect and I am very pleased that Soliton is to be joined by an operator of Equinor’s scale, capability and ambition.”
Soliton secured rights to P2390 in 2018 after the UK’s 30th offshore licensing round, and began searching for a partner earlier this year.