Production

Njord Field offshore mid-Norway back online following overhaul

Jan. 3, 2023

Equinor has restarted production from the Njord Field in the Norwegian Sea, six years after the Njord A platform and Njord B FSO were taken off station for upgrades in Norway.

Equinor says the Njord Field has been upgraded and is ready for another 20 years.

Offshore staff

STAVANGER, Norway — Equinor has restarted production from the Njord Field in the Norwegian Sea, six years after the Njord A platform and Njord B FSO were taken off station for upgrades onshore in Norway.

Aker Solutions had the main responsibility for the platform engineering and upgrading, while Brevik Engineering undertook engineering work for the FSO, which Aibel upgraded.

Njord came onstream when the facilities were expected to remain in operation until 2013. However, volumes of hydrocarbons in the field were larger than anticipated, and there were other discoveries in the area that could be tied into the facilities in addition to the Hyme Field, which started production through Njord A in 2013.

The Njord A platform was upgraded at Stord, while the Njord Bravo FSO was refurbished in Haugesund.

“Our ambition is to produce about the same volume from Njord and Hyme as we have produced so far, more than 250 MMboe," said Kjetil Hove, Equinor's executive vice president for Exploration & Production Norway.

The company plans to drill 10 new wells at Njord from the platform’s upgraded drilling facility, with more exploratory drilling in the surrounding area.

Upgrades to the platform and FSO will allow them to receive production from the Bauge and Fenja subsea developments, with combined resources of 110 MMbbl.

And later this decade, Njord should start receiving power from shore via the Draugen platform, 30 km to the east, cutting annual CO₂ emissions by about 130,000 metric tons.

Cost pressures, partly due to COVID-19, set back the restart of operations by about two years, with the projected capex now just over NOK31 billion (US$3.13 billion), compared with the original budget of NOK17 billion (US$1.715 billion).

Njord is 130 km northwest of Kristiansund in a water depth of 330 m. Produced oil is transported by pipeline to the Njord Bravo FSO, and onward by tankers.

Gas heads through a 40-km pipeline connected to the Åsgard transportation system, and from there to the Kårstø terminal in western Norway.

01.03.2023