With repairs done ahead of schedule, missing piece of TotalEnergies’ Tyra II puzzle back at huge North Sea asset

TotalEnergies EP Danmark, a subsidiary of France’s energy giant TotalEnergies, has fixed an equipment issue that came up a few months ago at its natural gas redevelopment project in the Danish sector of the North Sea, which derailed its schedule for boosting output to full technical capacity.

Shortly after the restart of gas production from Tyra II and the export of the first gas from the Tyra facilities, TotalEnergies, on behalf of its partners in the Danish Underground Consortium (DUC) – encompassing TotalEnergies EP Danmark (operator, 43.2%), BlueNord (36.8%), and Nordsøfonden (20%) – announced an operational occurrence was temporarily impacting the commissioning of the facilities during the ramp-up and testing period.

In May 2024, the firm disclosed that the commissioning and further ramp-up of the export and production from the Tyra II facilities would most likely be underway into the fourth quarter of 2024, while the investigation into the operational occurrence with the intermediate pressure (IP) gas compressor station continued.

The operator also revealed a technical issue with the low pressure (LP) compressor transformer and confirmed that actions were taken to remedy the impact and initiate repairs. The planned repair of the second transformer progressed ahead of the timeline, thus, the transformer was ready earlier than anticipated for transportation offshore to Tyra to be lifted back onto the processing facility followed by installation.

According to BlueNord, the second transformer on Tyra II has been lifted onto the processing module known as TEG after returning to the processing facility to be reconnected. Once it reaches full capacity, Tyra II is expected to deliver 2.8 billion cubic meters of gas per year, which amounts to 80% of the forecasted Danish gas production.

According to TotalEnergies, Tyra II represents the central hub for Danish natural gas production in the North Sea, processing gas from the Tyra field, which is said to be Denmark’s largest natural gas field, and the surrounding Harald, Svend, Roar, and Valdemar satellites along with the Dan field. 

TotalEnergies has been busy with multiple projects, including an oil one for which it recently reached a final investment decision (FID) off the coast of Suriname, with the first oil anticipated in 2028 at the earliest. The existing market prices indicate that the development will cost over $10 billion.