Equinor sets timeline for Rosebank FID

Norwegian oil firm Equinor has set a new timeline for the Rosebank offshore project in the UK.

The company which recently bought Chevron out of the Rosebank project, said Tuesday that after the award of a three-year extension for the Rosebank licenses by the UK Oil and Gas Authority, a final investment decision for Rosebank is now planned to be taken by May 2022.

An extension for a period of three years has been awarded for Licences P1026, P1191 and P1272.

“Together with our partners, Suncor, and Siccar Point, we are fully focused on bringing this much anticipated UK development to realization,” says Hedda Felin, Equinor’s senior vice president for UK and Ireland offshore.

Related: Equinor rethinking Rosebank plan (February 15/19)

“We believe there is more value to capture in Rosebank including the opportunity to reduce development cost. There are similarities with other recent projects in Equinor’s portfolio, such as Johan Castberg and Bay du Nord, where we have made significant improvements to the concept approach, particularly in how we design and plan new developments in harsh environments, but also through the application of digitalization.

“We see that improvements in the concept and planning phase will also support an efficient execution of the project,” Felin continues.

The Rosebank field was discovered in 2004 and lies about 130 km northwest of the Shetland Islands in water depths of approximately 1,110m. Equinor is the operator wirj a 40 per cent interest and other partners in the field are Suncor Energy (40%) and Siccar Point Energy (20%).

The potentially recoverable volumes at Rosebank are expected to be more than 300 million barrels.

Before Equinor bought Chevron’s stake and took over the operatorship of the field, Chevron planned to develop Rosebank as a subsea development tied back to a floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel, with natural gas exported via pipeline.