The Norwegian Petroleum Directorate has formally agreed to start oil and gas production under the PL460 license. Production start is planned for March.

“The formal approval of the Norwegian administration is good information. It means that we will be able to start mining from another deposit on the Norwegian Continental Shelf on schedule. The use of the existing infrastructure in a deposit that is neighboring the Skogul field is of great importance for reducing its operating costs. Starting production means additional revenues, which will support the results achieved by our Norwegian company this year already,” said Jerzy Kwieciński, President of the PGNiG Management Board.

PGNiG Upstream Norway, a subsidiary of PGNiG SA, owns 35 percent shares in the Skogul deposit. The owner of the remaining shares and the operator of the license is Aker BP, from which PGNiG bought its shares in 2017. The deposit was discovered in 2010 and the development plan was adopted in 2018. Skogul hydrocarbon reserves attributable to PGNiG Upstream Norway amount to approximately 3.3 million boe (barrels of oil equivalent).

The Skogul field is located in the immediate vicinity of the Vilje field, in which PGNiG Upstream Norway holds 24.24 percent stake. Thanks to the existing production infrastructure, the gas extracted from Skogul will go through Vilje to the Alvheim FPSO. The company estimates that the increase in own production due to the start of extraction from the new deposit will amount to over 4,000 boe a day.

PGNiG has been operating in Norway since 2007. PGNiG Upstream Norway currently holds shares in 29 exploration and production licenses on the Norwegian Continental Shelf. Recent acquisition of shares in another two is pending administrative approval. The intensification of deposit acquisitions over the past three years has allowed the Company to increase its natural gas and crude oil reserves from 80 million to around 200 million boe.

PGNiG currently extracts crude oil and natural gas from five fields in Norway. Investment and analytical works are carried out on six successive deposits. In addition to starting production from Skogul, this year production is planned to be launched from the Ærfugl deposit.