Statoil’s Troll field is about to see a natural gas increase of about 83 Bcm this month after the installation of two giant compressors at Troll A, offshore Norway. The US$1.2 billion (NOK 10 billion) project came in at $121 million (NOK 1 billion) under budget, and will see an extension at the field of nearly two decades.
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The compressor module before departure from Thailand. Image from Aibel. |
The Troll field lies in the northern part of the North Sea, around 65km west of Kollsnes, near Bergen. The field is comprised of the main Troll East and Troll West structures in blocks 31/2, 31/3, 31/5 and 31/6.
Troll already had two compressors, and the addition of the two new compressors will ensure 120 MMcm/d from the Troll field, which totals to 30 Bcm/d, an equivalent of the consumption of 10 million households in Europe.
During the past 18 months Statoil has started up low-pressure compressors on Troll A, Kvitebjørn, Heidrun, Kristin, Åsgard and Gullfaks, the last two on the seabed. This increases the recovery rate by more than 1.2 billion bbl and extends the life of the installations. The project has extended the expected life of Troll A from 2045 to 2063, the company said.
“These investments in existing fields give highly profitable barrels. The field recovery increase the compressors provide, 83 billion standard cubic metres of gas or 533 million barrels of oil equivalent, is more than the Aasta Hansteen and Valemon fields combined,” Gunnar Nakken, Statoil senior VP for the operations west cluster said.
As the gas is being produced, the pressure in the reservoir drops. Statoil then reduces pressure on the wellheads to be able to recover more gas, with help from the compressors.
Other activities at the field include five new 70km-long cables that were laid between Troll and land, in addition to building a converter station at Kollsnes. Space was also freed up for new modules on Troll A.
In May, Norway-based Aibel was able to deliver three new module for the Troll A platform project. Aibel built the compressor module at its Thailand yard. The integrated utility (IU) module was prefabricated in Poland and assembled in Haugesund, where the smallest module was also built. The three modules total more than 6000 tonnes.
Statoil celebrated 20 operational years at the Troll field last month, reporting 1.56 billion bbl produced in the past two decades and about $53.76 billion (NOK 460 billion) in income.
Statoil operates the Troll A, B and C platforms with 30.58% interest. Partners include Petoro (56%), Norske Shell (8.10%), Total E&P Norge (3.69%), and ConocoPhillips (1.62%).
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