Green light for Vår Energi to use FPSO destined for North Sea oil project

Norwegian offshore safety regulator has given Vår Energi consent to take advantage of living quarters, helicopter decks, and cranes on a floating production, storage, and offloading (FPSO) vessel revamped for deployment on a field in the North Sea off the coast of Norway. 

The consent from the Norwegian Ocean Industry Authority (Havtil) enables Vår Energi to make use of the living quarters, helicopter decks, and cranes on the FPSO Jotun, which is set to work at the Balder and Ringhorne Øst fields.

Discovered in 1967, the Balder field in the central part of the North Sea, just west of the Grane field, lies in a water depth of 125 meters. The initial plan for development and operation (PDO) was approved in 1996, allowing production to start in 1999. This field has been developed with subsea wells tied back to the FPSO Balder.

On the other hand, the Ringhorne deposit, situated nine kilometers north of the FPSO Balder and included in the Balder complex, is developed with a combined accommodation, drilling, and wellhead facility, tied back not only to the FPSO Balder but also the FPSO Jotun for processing, crude oil storage, and gas export. 

As the revised PDO for Balder and Ringhorne was approved in June 2020, the development plan encapsulates a lifetime extension and relocation of the FPSO Jotun, and the drilling of new subsea wells. Earlier this month, the sail-away of the unit was said to be on schedule for production from Balder X to start by the end of the second quarter of 2025.

The tow-out program for the vessel from Worley Rosenberg yard in Stavanger comes in several stages, with the FPSO set to perform inclination tests at the quayside before being towed to Åmøyfjorden, near Stavanger, for inshore sea trials and anchor installation work before final commissioning.

After all 14 wells are completed, production is planned to start by the end of the second quarter of 2025, with an expected 3-4 month ramp-up period before hitting peak production. Vår Energi sanctioned Balder Phase V in Q4 2024, targeting start-up in late 2025.

Therefore, the first new wells are scheduled to come on stream by the end of 2025 via subsea tie-back to the FPSO Jotun. The Balder field is operated by Vår Energi (90%) with Kistos Energy Norway as its partner (10%).

The Norwegian firm’s Balder X project, targeting a start-up in Q2 2025, is set to recover around 200 million barrels of additional reserves from the Balder-Ringhorne area, where the production lifetime is being prolonged to 2045, as part of the Balder Future redevelopment project in the North Sea.

Vår Energi sees multiple new early phase projects being progressed toward final investment decisions (FIDs) in the Greater Balder area, such as Ringhorne North, Balder Future phases, and the King discovery, targeting gross contingent resources of over 70 mmboe.