Spirit Energy Makes Small Oil Discovery Offshore Norway

Spirit Energy has made a small oil discovery in exploration well 35/9-14, located in license PL 682 on the Norwegian Shelf.

The well encountered 20 meters of hydrocarbon bearing, ‘poor quality’ sandstone of Oxfordian age in the Heather Formation, Spirit revealed. A down-dip sidetrack, 35/9-14 A, also found 30 meters of sandstone with hydrocarbon shows, but the reservoir quality was ‘poor and below expectations’, according to Spirit. 

Extensive data acquisition and sampling has been carried out in both wells and work will now be carried out to evaluate the data acquired. The wells were drilled with the semi-submersible drilling rig Songa Enabler.

Well 35/9-14 is the first of eight exploration wells Spirit Energy Norge will participate in this year, four of which will be as operator.

In a brief research note sent to Rigzone, oil and gas analysts at GMP FirstEnergy described the well results as ‘negative’, highlighting that the discovery was not currently profitable.

“Although the overall result of wells 35/9-14 and 35/9-14 A is disappointing, the wells confirm that the stratigraphic trapping mechanism for the prospect works,” Arne Westeng, director of Spirit Energy, said in a company statement.

“This is encouraging for further exploration of the upper Jurassic in this part of the North Sea. The data acquired will be valuable to further develop our understanding of reservoir quality distribution which is critical for maturation of the remaining upper Jurassic prospectivity in the area,” Westeng added.

Spirit Energy is the operator of PL 682 with a 30 percent working interest. The partners are Capricorn Norge AS with 30 percent, Wellesley Petroleum AS with 20 percent and Petoro with 20 percent.