Groningen to shut down sooner, claims minister
The Netherlands’ government may shut down production at the Groningen gas field earlier than its stated 2030 target, the Dutch economy minister Eric Wiebes said on the local NPO Radio 1 public radio service on August 27.
“I expect the Groningen field to no longer be necessary very soon,” he said in an interview. “Things are moving very fast, a lot faster than anyone would have predicted some time ago." Production will end much sooner than the end of the next decade, Wiebes said, noting he would inform parliament about the exact date shortly.
Pressure has been mounting on the government to bring the 2030 deadline forward. Its output during the year that began October 2018 has been capped at 19.4bn m3. In the year starting this October, the government has said it could be limited to 12.8bn m³ with further steep drops in the following few years.
“We used to think that production would go on forever, then I said it would end by 2030, and I will soon say when it will end exactly,” he explained. Reductions at Groningen over recent years have increased Europe's dependency on gas imports, namely from Russia and LNG.
Operated by ExxonMobil and Shell through their NAM joint venture, Groningen is the largest gas field in Europe and has been producing for over 50 years since the majors discovered it. The Netherlands announced plans last year to slash production at the project to zero by 2030, however, after years of earthquakes linked to activities at the site. Given the sharp decline in output in the coming few years, it is not certain that operating the field would make commercial sense for much longer.