Equinor has started drilling operations on its Kveikje exploration well in the Norwegian section of the North Sea, its partner in the license, Longboat Energy, said Wednesday.
Equinor is using Odfjell Drilling's Deepsea Stavanger semi-submersible drilling rig to drill the prospect, an Eocene Balder Formation injectite with seismic amplitude support.
"Injectite reservoirs are typically characterized by excellent reservoir properties, with recent exploration successes of this type including the King and Frosk discoveries in the Balder and Alvheim area respectively. The exploration well has further potential upside in the underlying Paleocene Rokke and Late Cretaceous n’Roll secondary prospects," Longboat said.
Area Cluster Development
Kveikje is estimated to contain gross mean prospective resources of 36 mmboe with further potential upside estimated at 79 mmboe on a gross basis. The chance of success associated with the Kveikje prospect is 55% with the key risks being trap presence and seal integrity, Longboat added.
"Kveikje is the primary prospect in license PL293B, which lies in an area north of the giant Troll field in the Norwegian North Sea with many producing fields and significant infrastructure. The Kveikje well will be drilled close to recent discoveries, lying c. 8km from the Swisher discovery and c. 10km from the Toppand discovery. If successful, Kveikje could potentially form part of an area cluster development," Longboat, which owns a 10% in the offshore block, said.
'Rokke n' Roll'
According to Longboat, Rokke and n’Roll have an additional 127 mmboe of gross mean prospective resource with chances of success in the range of 14%-34% which have not been reviewed by ERCE and are based on Equinor's estimates. The drilling of the Kveikje well 35/10-8S is expected to take up to four weeks to drill.