Statoil Working on Partial Restart of Snorre B Field in North Sea

"Statoil tells us the situation is stable, but not clear. There is so far no indication that there are any hydrocarbon leaks," he said.

Statoil said it was working to resume some production at Snorre B. There are four templates on the seabed. One template is affected by the shift on the seabed, while the three others were shut due to a separate incident, a power failure that occurred on Sunday.

"We are now working hard on getting the three templates back in production," Statoil spokesman Oerjan Heradstveit told Reuters. It was not yet known when the production at those templates could resume, he said.

An analyst said the incident was negative for the company's 2014 earnings outlook.

"The shut in increases the risk to our 2014 EPS (earnings per share) estimate of NOK 17.0," Teodor Sveen Nilsen at Swedbank wrote in a note to clients.

Statoil's share of production from the field was 32,000 barrels per day in the first quarter of this year, Nilsen said. Production from Snorre B accounts for about half of the total production of the field's, Statoil has said.

The firm said it had not detected any leaks of oil and gas from the reservoir into a pit formed under the template.