Statoil has awarded Aker Solutions a contract for hiring of an entirely new type of rig which represents an important technological advance for the industry. The estimated value of the total contract is USD 1.9 billion.
The category B rig will be an important contribution towards increasing recovery from existing fields.
Development of technology for increasing the recovery from operating fields is an area of commitment for Statoil. For the last year, the average oil recovery rate from Statoil operated fields has risen from 49 percent to 50 percent.
The category B rig is designed and equipped for the industrialisation of drilling and intervention services in existing production wells and represent a new sort of service.
“This will be a very important part of the toolbox for increased recovery on the Norwegian continental shelf, making it possible to produce oil and gas that otherwise would be lost,” says Statoil executive vice president of Technology, Projects and Drilling, Margareth Øvrum. “The category B rig is the result of long-term, targeted technology development to increase subsea well recovery rates.”
In cooperation with the supplier industry, Statoil has developed a new type of rig and well control system specially adapted to carry out well intervention and drilling operations in existing subsea wells.
This type of rig fills the gap between light intervention vessels (category A) and conventional rigs (category C).
The category B rig with associated integrated services is expected to reduce operating costs for well intervention by as much as 40%.
Statoil and the licensees will enter into an eight-year contract with options for three times two years for the category B service. The estimated value of the contract is USD 1.9 billion. In addition to rig rental, the contract also includes rental of the necessary equipment and services to carry out well intervention, sidetrack drilling, ROV operations, well testing and cementing.
The rig will be in service during 2015.




The National Congress of Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg's Labour Party has voted yes to do a study that examines the effects of potential oil drilling in the Lofoten-Vesterålen area in the north of Norway.
..
Norwegian engineering firm Aker Solutions has entered a frame agreement with Petrobras to provide subsea equipment for the oil company's deepwater pre-salt field developments in Brazil.
..
Final investments in oil and gas activity in 2012 - including pipeline transportation - were NOK 172.5 billion; 18 per cent higher than in 2011. The forecast for 2013 has been adjusted downwards to NOK 198.7 billion, according to Statistics Norway.
..
This week, Statoil and its partners began production from the Hyme oil field in the southern part of the Norwegian Sea. Hyme is the second of Statoil’s 12 so-called fast-track projects.
..









