Equinor makes seventh oil and gas discovery in North Sea
(WO) — Equinor has made an oil and gas discovery close to the Troll field in the North Sea. This is the seventh discovery in this area since the autumn of 2019.
The name of the discovery is Røver Sør. According to preliminary estimates, the size of the discovery is between 17 and 47 MMboe, of which the majority is oil. The two exploration wells of the discovery were drilled by the Transocean Spitsbergen rig.
Equinor is the operator of the production license. The partners are DNO, Wellesley Petroleum and Petoro.
Seventh oil discovery since fall 2019
This recent oil discovery comes on the heels of six others in the area, including Echino Sør (2019), Swisher (2020), Røver Nord (2021), Blasto (2021), Toppand (2022), and Kveikje (2022).
“Discoveries close to existing infrastructure are important to maintain oil and gas production from the Norwegian continental shelf. They need smaller volumes to be profitable and can be put on stream quickly with low carbon emissions. As this discovery is close to the Troll field and other discoveries we have made in the area, we can already now state that it will be commercial,” says Geir Sørtveit, Equinor’s Senior Vice President for Exploration and Production West Operations.
There is uncertainty as to the size of the discoveries, but an average of the various estimates gives a total volume of around 350 million barrels of oil equivalent, corresponding to a medium-sized Norwegian oil or gas field, and the size of the Aasta Hansteen field in the Norwegian sea.
“Equinor has started field development projects to coordinate the development of these discoveries by utilizing existing infrastructure in collaboration with our partners. This discovery will be part of this work,” says Sørtveit.
The name of the next exploration well in this area is Heisenberg. The results of this well are to be ready in March. More exploration wells are planned in the area later this year.
