Statoil to Lay up COSL Pioneer Rig for Short Time

Statoil reported late Wednesday that it will lay up the COSL Pioneer (mid-water semisub) rig during the fourth quarter of 2014, but that taking the rig out of operation temporarily will have no impact on the firm's production targets or planned exploration activity on the Norwegian Continental Shelf.

Currently, the rig is being put to work on the Visund field and it is scheduled to complete this work by the end of September. The move follows Statoil's announcement at the beginning of July that its Scarabeo 5 rig will also be taken off operations at the end of September until 2015.

"After a careful review of our drilling plan, we find it necessary to suspend COSL Pioneer for the time being," Tore Aarreberg, Statoil's rig procurement manager, said in a company statement.

"At the moment we have three rigs contracted from COSL Drilling Europe. Our offshore organization enjoys excellent cooperation with the contractor's drilling teams, and the COSL Pioneer has demonstrated consistent, high efficiency in drilling operations. We are in close dialogue with the contractor concerning how the suspension of the rig will be implemented in practice, and we continue to look forward to many years of cooperation with COSL on the Norwegian shelf."

Statoil added that it still plans to drill between 20 and 25 exploration wells on the NCS in 2014.

 



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