Last week, operator Equinor and partners announced an investment of 1.4 billion NOK that will help safeguard another phase of low-pressure production from the field that started production in 1999.
“The current recovery rate for the field is almost 50 percent, but our ambition is to extract 60 percent of the hydrocarbons in the reservoirs before the field will have to be shut down,” says Randi Hugdahl, vice president for Åsgard operations.
The selected concept is a modification of the platform to reduce inlet pressure by replacing the reinjection compressors and rebuilding parts of the processing facility. Planned start-up of low-pressure production is in 2023.
The Åsgard field complex produces gas and considerable amounts of condensate from Lower and Middle Jurassic sandstones at depths of as much as 4850 metres. The reservoir quality varies in the different formations, and there are large variations in the reservoir properties between the three Åsgard acummulations. The Smørbukk pool is in a rotated fault block and contains gas, condensate and oil in the Åre, Tilje, Tofte, Ile and Garn Formations. The Smørbukk Sør pool contains oil, gas and condensate in the Tilje, Ile and Garn Formations. The Midgard gas pool is divided into four structural segments with the main reservoir in the Ile and Garn Formations.
Midgard was discovered by Saga in 1981. Equinor found Smørbukk in 1984 and Smørbukk South in 1985. In 1995 the licence rights were coordinated in a new ownership structure with then Statoil, now Equinor, as operator.
Partners in the Åsgard licence are Equinor (operator) at 34.57%, Petoro AS at 35.69%, Vår Energi AS at 22.06% and Total E&P Norge AS at 7.68%.
