Page 11 - EurOil Week 02 2022

EurOil PROJECTS & COMPANIES EurOil

Equinor finds more oil

near Fram field

NORWAY NORWAY’S Equinor has made Norway’s first in the year to date. It was made just 8 km from the
hydrocarbon discovery of the year, reporting on Equinor-operated Fram. Equinor said it would
It lies near existing January 7 that it had found oil near the Fram field consider tying the discovery back to either the
infrastructure. in the North Sea. Troll B or Troll C platforms, resulting in “a short
Preliminary calculations place the size of the payback period and low CO2 emissions.”
find at between 3.3 and 5.2mn cubic metres of Equinor reported the discovery of 75-120mn
recoverable oil equivalent, or 21-33mn barrels. barrels of oil equivalent only 3 km from Fram
It was made at two wells drilled in the Troll and in March 2021. Previously it found a further
Fram area by the West Hercules rig. 38-100mn boe at a similar distance to the field
Fram has been in production since 2003, in late November.
although the project has seen a revival in recent The latest wells were the second and third to
years on the back of development of its gas be drilled in production licence 630, which was
reserves. It lies north of Troll, Norway’s biggest awarded to Equinor in the 2011 APA round. The
gas producer, online since 1995. Norwegian state company has a 50% interest in
“Several discoveries in the Troll and Gram the licence, while a further 50% is held by Welles-
area during the past few years demonstrate that ley Petroleum.
even mature areas can be revitalised based on The Norwegian Fram field is not to be con-
new information and modern exploration tech- fused with the field of the same name off the
nology,” Equinor said in a statement. coast of the UK, which Shell put into operation
The latest find, known as Toppand, is the fifth in September last year. ™

Romgaz’ takeover of 50% stake in

Neptun Deep delayed by procedures

ROMANIA THE transfer of a 50% stake in the Neptun Deep Romgaz shareholders since December 10, 2021,
Black Sea offshore perimeter to the state-con- and the market expected the documents to be
The estimated delay trolled company Romgaz from ExxonMobil as signed quickly.
time has not yet been per the contract already signed is temporarily Romgaz already approved the contracting of
revealed. blocked due to a controversy related to the fact a €325mn loan to cover part of the deal.
that the operating license is held by the Amer- On the other hand, the Romanian gov-
ican company through a vehicle registered in ernment is waiting for the conclusion of
the Bahamas and not in Romania, government the Romgaz-ExxonMobil transaction
sources told Economedia. to send the draft Offshore Law to the
The exact nature of the obstacle and the esti- parliament.
mated delay time have not yet been revealed. At The Offshore Law is important because it will
the moment, the two sides are looking for a solu- unblock OMV Petrom’s final investment deci-
tion to speed up the €1bn deal, sources familiar sion in this project. Other offshore operators are
with the deal quoted by the source said. expecting changes in the Offshore Law before
The transaction had been approved by sending gas to the market. ™

Week 02 13•January•2022 www. NEWSBASE .com P11