Page 17 - EurOil Week 45

EurOil PROJECTS & COMPANIES EurOil

Wintershall Noordzee axes oil project

over Dutch nitrogen impasse

NETHERLANDS GERMAN-RUSSIAN joint venture Wintershall with 20% and Taqa and Rosewood each with 5%.
Noordzee has announced it has axed plans to The company “has decided to withdraw the
Wintershall Noordzee develop the Rembrandt and Vermeer oilfields environmental permit applications for the F17
had aimed to take an off the Netherlands because of environmental Rembrandt and Vermeer oil development pro-
FID in late 2020. permitting delays. ject on the Dutch continental shelf and defer the
The announcement marks another setback project as a result of delays in the environmental
for the Dutch upstream sector, which has been permitting process,” its managing director, Rob-
grappling with permitting problems since a court ert Frimpong, said in a statement.
ruling last year on nitrogen oxide emissions. Wintershall Noordzee had aimed to take a
The Rembrandt and Vermeer oilfields were final investment decision (FID) at Rembrandt
discovered in 2012-2014 and were due to be and Vermeer in late 2020.
developed jointly. Rembrandt alone holds some The Council of State ruled last year that the
30mn barrels of oil equivalent (boe). Netherlands’ previous standards for issuing con-
In a statement, though, Wintershall Noordzee struction permits violated EU laws protecting
said the project had fallen foul of regulations gov- the environment from nitrogen oxides. This has
erning nitrogen emissions, with no path forward created an impasse, putting billions of dollars of
in sight. The project had been expected to yield projects in many industrial sectors on hold.
20,000 barrels per day (bpd) of oil at full capacity. Restrictions on new projects come at a time
Wintershall Noordzee, a joint venture when the Netherlands is preparing to decom-
between Germany’s Wintershall Dea and Russia’s mission its largest field, Groningen, in under
Gazprom, operates the F17a licence containing two years. Groningen’s shutdown will leave the
the fields with a 30% interest. Its partners are Netherlands, once a major gas exporter, reliant
state-owned EBN with 40%, Neptune Energy on imports from Russia and the North Sea. ™

Tyra field’s restart delayed by a year

DENMARK THE restart of Denmark’s largest gas field after Tyra’s closure led Denmark to become a net
a redevelopment programme has been delayed importer of gas, reliant on supplies from neigh-
Tyra accounted for 90% by a year as a result of coronavirus (COVID-19) bouring Germany. The project is managed by the
of Danish gas output related disruptions. Danish Underground Consortium (DUC), con-
until its closure in The Total-operated Tyra field accounted for sisting of Total as operator with 43.2%, Noreco
September last year. 90% of Danish gas output until its closure in Sep- with 36.8% and Denmark’s state-owned Nord-
tember last year. It will not resume production sofonden with 20%.
until the second quarter of 2023, compared with The setback at Tyra comes after the Danish
an original target of July 1, 2022, project partner Energy Agency (DEA) in September slashed its
Noreco confirmed in a statement on November 6. forecast for the country’s commercial gas pro-
“Due to COVID-19, local governmental duction in 2024 by 4% to 3bn cubic metres. That
imposed restrictions at fabrication yards have forecast will likely have to be revised again in
impacted the schedule of the new Tyra topsides, light of delays at the field.
including through the global supply chain deliv- Once back in action, Tyra is expected to pro-
ering key components for the topsides,” Noreco duce around 60,000 barrels of oil equivalent per
explained. “As a directive consequence of this day (boepd) of gas, equating to over 200mn boe
impact the installation of the four new topsides over a 25-year period. The DEA expects Den-
is rescheduled from 2021 to a 2022 installation mark to emerge as a net gas exporter again and
window. First production from the redeveloped retain the status until after 2035. This is despite
Tyra is expected in Q2 2023.” significant uncertainty about further oil and gas
Tyra began producing gas in 1984, and in the licensing off the country’s coast, amid ongoing
subsequent decades its platforms subsided by debate about whether exploring for oil and gas is
more than 5 metres, according to Total. Their in line with Denmark’s ambitious climate goals.
topsides were removed in August and will be The government launched a contest for North
replaced with new and elevated topsides, while Sea acreage last year, but awards were delayed
jacket extensions will be fitted onto the existing and some companies that took part have since
jacket structures. withdrawn their bids. ™

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