Equinor and its partners have discovered oil and gas at the Grimsnes prospect in the Oseberg area of the North Sea, about 140 km west of Bergen. Preliminary estimates put the find at 3-8 million standard cu m of oil equivalent, or 19-50 million boe.
Well 30/8-7 S was drilled by Odfjell Drilling's Deepsea Bergen semisubmersible in 96 m of water. It was the fifth exploration well in production license 190.
What the well found
The well hit a combined oil and gas column of 54 m in the Middle Jurassic Tarbert Formation. That column is made up of 39 m of gas and 15 m of oil. The Tarbert measured 264 m in total thickness, including 111 m of sandstone with moderate to good reservoir properties.
The secondary targets in the Ness and Etive formations held aquiferous sandstones, though the Ness showed a few potential hydrocarbon-filled zones. The well reached a vertical depth of 3,752 m below sea level, finished in the Lower Jurassic Drake Formation, and was plugged and abandoned.
Next steps for the license
The licensees are Equinor as operator, Petoro and TotalEnergies. They are studying options to tie the discovery back to existing Oseberg-area infrastructure. The license also contains the Tune field and lies near the Oseberg Sør field, both operated by Equinor.
The Deepsea Bergen will now move to the Visund Sør field to drill a development well.
The result adds to recent upstream news from the region. We reported that Equinor and Aker BP reported a gas and condensate find near Norway's Balder field (read it here).
