23. September 20199. October 2019 by bjorn

What’s in a name

By Björn Lindberg

Confusion can easily arise over the terms used in connection with Ekofisk, where the Greater Ekofisk Area (GEA) is a collective designation for a cluster of no less than eight fields. The largest of these is Ekofisk itself.

— Older poster showing The Greater Ekofisk area. Illustration: ConocoPhillips/Norwegian Petroleum Museum

The Greater Ekofisk Area (GEA) and its constituent fields lie primarily lie in PL 018 (red frame). Those with dotted boundaries have ceased production, while those with lilac borders were producing at 29 August 2019. Note that Valhall and Hod in the south-east corner of the map are not part of the GEA.

Primarily located in production licence PL 018, along with Ekofisk, the other seven fields are West Ekofisk, Tor, Eldfisk, Albuskjell, Edda, Cod and Embla.

Furthermore, six of the eight – with Embla and Cod as the exception – comprise two geological formations. One is known as the Ekofisk formation, with the Tor formation as the other. See the article on sea scurf.

The graph in figure 2, which presents collective production of oil, gas and condensate over time in million standard cubic metres of oil equivalent (scm oe), shows Ekofisk’s dominant position – both historically and today.

Historical production from the Ekofisk area since the start of output in 1971 until the end of 2018. The base data were acquired from the norskpetroleum.no website on 29 August 2019.

With the exception of four years, overall output from the seven other fields has never achieved the same volume as Ekofisk’s own production.

The effect of waterflooding on Ekofisk, which got going seriously in 1987, can be clearly seen in the production curve. This rose from less than 10 million scm oe per annum to more than 20 million.

On 1 July 2019, operator ConocoPhillips submitted a plan for development and operation (PDO) which covered reopening the Tor field (Tor II).

This will involve the investment of about NOK 6 billion, with a planned production start in late 2020, and is expected to yield an estimated 10 million scm oe.

Furthermore, the licensees have initiated concept studies for further development of the northern flank of Eldfisk (Eldfisk II). Both subsea solutions and a simple unmanned platform are under consideration.[REMOVE]Fotnote: https://petro.no/nyheter/conocophillips-vurderer-a-bygge-ny-plattform-pa-eldfisk-nord

Development of the Tommeliten Alpha formation, which has only ranked as a discovery so far, is also being assessed.[REMOVE]Fotnote: https://petro.no/nyheter/forbereder-mulig-utbygging-tommeliten-alpha