Norwegian oil and gas player Vår Energi has confirmed the tow-out of a floating production, storage, and offloading (FPSO) vessel from the Worley Rosenberg yard to a field in the North Sea off the coast of Norway. This revamped unit is part of the firm’s plan to ramp up production to exceed 400,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day (kboepd) while extending the lifetime of an existing asset to 2045 and potentially even beyond.
The FPSO Jotun’s sail-away is on schedule for production from Balder X to start by the end of the second quarter of 2025. The tow-out program for the FPSO from Worley Rosenberg yard in Stavanger includes several stages. The FPSO vessel will perform inclination tests at the quayside before being towed to Åmøyfjorden, near Stavanger, for inshore sea trials and anchor installation work.
Afterward, the unit will be towed to the field for installation, hook-up to the installed subsea production systems, and final commissioning. Once all 14 wells are completed, production is planned to start by the end of the second quarter of 2025, with an expected 3-4 month ramp-up period before hitting peak production. Vår Energi sanctioned Balder Phase V in the fourth quarter of 2024, targeting start-up in late 2025.
The firm made six discoveries in 2024, including two in the fourth quarter, with a nearly 50% exploration success rate for the year. In a bid to up its hydrocarbon production, the firm decided to kick off drilling activities in the first half of 2025 and finish them in 2026.
