Johan Castberg to Be Powered by Gas Turbines

Statoil and its licence partners have opted for gas-fired power solution for Johan Castberg as the most suitable and socio-economic solution for the development.

Aker Solutions, Aibel, ABB, Unitech, Pöyry and Thema Consulting have contributed to the power analysis.

The power solutions include full and/or partial electrification based on power from land as well as gas-fired power.

Due to the long distance and technical challenges the cost of the measures related to partial/full electrification would be high, from just above NOK 5000 per tonne of CO2 to just above NOK 8000 per tonne of CO2.

Investment costs for full/partial electrification would span from more than NOK 4 billion to just above NOK 12 billion.

According to Statoil, the Johan Castberg power solution effort reveals that costs related to land-based power, including technical challenges, represent a risk to both the timeline and feasibility of the project.

“We have developed a highly energy-efficient solution involving use of gas turbines for power generation on Johan Castberg. By use of heat recovery we achieve a turbine power efficiency of 64%, which is an outstanding result from use of gas turbines on offshore platforms. The licence partners consider gas-fired power to be the most suitable and socio-economic solution for the development,” says Margareth Øvrum, executive vice president for Technology, Projects and Drilling in Statoil..

Johan Castberg will be prepared for future electrification by use of alternating current technology in case this becomes an efficient and feasible solution in the future.

Emissions from Johan Castberg by use of gas turbines will be 0.27 million tonnes of CO2 per year, or 2% of current annual emissions from the NCS.