Norway's Oda Field Starts up

Spirit Energy's Oda field offshore Norway, 13 km east of Ula in the North Sea, began oil and gas production March 19, the regulator Norwegian Petroleum Directorate said.

This compares with the originally planned date of August 1, given in the field development plan. The company has also cut 15% from the original cost, which now stands at Nkr 4.6bn ($540mn), down from Nkr 5.4bn. "Important reasons for the cost cuts include efficient drilling of production wells and a new type of co-operation with suppliers," Spirit said.

Oda is a subsea development where the wellstream is routed on to the Ula platform for processing and transport. The processing equipment and hook-up to the Ula platform are reused from the shutdown Oselvar field. The NPD said it was pleased that the Oda licensees "have chosen a development solution that contributes to cost-effective utilisation of existing infrastructure in the area, and that produced gas and water from Oda will be used to improve oil recovery on Ula." Of the production, 95% is oil.

The licensees are Spirit Energy (operator, 40%), Suncor Energy (30%), UK Faroe Petroleum (15 %) and Aker BP (15%). Faroe has since been bought by Norwegian DNO. Spirit Energy is a joint venture between UK utility Centrica and Germany's Bayerngas.