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Potential ‘game changer’ for Canada
Gary Park For Petroleum News
Statoil, drawing on its experience in Norway’s offshore, and its minority partner Husky Energy have added a large building block to what shapes up as a new production basin in Atlantic Canada.
Statoil as operator, with Husky holding a 35 percent stake, have reported their third oil discovery in the past three years and are estimating they have up to 800 million barrels of recoverable crude from just two of those finds.
The Norwegian company said that after more exploration Flemish Pass could become a core producing area post-2020 and be a “game changer for Canada.”
‘New petroleum system’ Statoil spokesman Ola Moreten Aanestad said the partnership’s latest discovery is “the largest pure oil discovery made by Statoil outside Norway. We are opening up a new petroleum system.”
The find, about 310 miles northeast of St. John’s, Newfoundland, resulted from a sidetrack well of the original discovery announced in August.
The Mizzen discovery in Flemish Pass in 2010 is believed to have up to 200 million barrels of recoverable reserves, while volumes will not be confirmed for the Harpoon discovery made during the summer until evaluation work has been completed.
All three finds are in about 3,600 feet of water and have yielded light oil of 34 API from Jurassic reservoirs with high porosity and high permeability.
Seismic, additional drilling Statoil Executive Vice President Tim Dodson said an “optimal development solution” depends on more work, including seismic and additional exploration and drilling, given that only a few wells have been drilled in the large license area.
Aanestad was reluctant to compare Flemish Pass with other mega-finds, including Statoil’s Sverdrup discovery offshore Norway, which holds about 3.3 billion barrels.
“I can’t speculate on that ... but this is an area we have great faith in,” he said.
Lars-Henrik Roren, a Norwegian analyst with Enskilda, doubted the Flemish Pass will match the Sverdrup play, but suggested there could be a “few more” finds in the range of 100 million barrels. He said more complete details will probably not be known for 12 to 15 months.
Roren said Statoil does not have any more rig slots available until 2016, although the company could be “more flexible with its rig capacity.”
Offshore Newfoundland has been producing since 1997 and expects to average 230,000 barrels per day this year from the shallow-water Hibernia, Terra Nova and White Rose fields, with Herbon due to join the trio in 2018 with another 150,000 bpd.
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