Author: Oksana Hillervik

The first steel for Hod B was cut in Aker Solutions’ yard in Verdal, the day after the Norwegian Parliament adopted temporary changes in the petroleum tax regime in June 2020.

“Production start-up from Hod B less than two years after, is great news! It demonstrates how the temporary tax changes, matured in the spring of 2020 when the industry was paralyzed by a pandemic and a sharp fall in oil prices, has had a real impact. Aker BP and Pandion Energy responded immediately to the politicians’ expectation of creating activity for the supplier industry across the country,” says Karl Johnny Hersvik, CEO of Aker BP.

Aker BP and Pandion Energy responded immediately to the politicians’ expectation of creating activity for the supplier industry across the country.

“There are many who can celebrate the start of profitable production with almost zero CO2 emissions from the Hod field. Through projects like Hod B, we are creating value both for the company, partners, alliance partners, owners and the Norwegian society at large. We are also contributing to sustain a world-leading supplier industry in Norway. I am especially proud of the fact that, through the Hod project, Aker BP has contributed to the vocational training of 50 apprentices”, Hersvik adds.

In line with the rapid sanctioning of Hod B, the project has been both safely and efficiently delivered through a demanding period: 14 months after the first steel was cut in Verdal, the platform was installed offshore – in accordance with the plan.

Strengthening the future of Valhall

Hod B is a normally unmanned wellhead platform, remotely operated from the Valhall field centre. Production from the Hod field will have close to zero CO2 emissions thanks to power from shore.

Aker BP and partner Pandion Energy expects Hod to produce 40 million barrels of oil equivalent.

CEO Jan Christian Ellefsen in Pandion Energy states the following:

This is an important milestone in revitalising the Valhall area and will increase our production on the NCS further. For Pandion Energy, this also marks the successful development of our third PDO, all with a clear environmental profile being powered from shore with ultra-low CO2 emissions.

Jan Christian Ellefsen, CEO of Pandion Energy, stated the following: 

During our first five years in operation, we have grown to become a recognized player in exploration and development on the NCS.

”Our 10 per cent interest in the Valhall area gives us daily production of over 5 000 barrels of oil equivalents. In March 2022, we announced the acquisition of the Norwegian operations of Dutch company ONE-Dyas, which represents a new quantum leap in the Pandion Energy story and secures the foundation for further growth. 

This transaction includes a 10 per cent share of the Nova field, which is planned to come on stream in the second half of this year. When that field reaches plateau output, our daily production will be more than doubled.  Also nearly doubling our exploration bank, the ONE-Dyas portfolio fits well with our existing holdings. The Nova development is a subsea infrastructure with a low CO2 footprint, well in line with our ESG strategy. 

We are entering 2022 with a strong balance sheet which permits further merger and acquisition activities. We remain committed to our strategy of being an active, responsible partner and a full-cycle oil and gas company with long-term ambitions.” 

Total revenues and other income for 2021 amounted to USD 135.9 million (2020:USD 116.6 million) and comprised net sales of oil and gas and gain/loss from hedging positions. 

The increase in revenue mainly reflected higher commodity prices combined with larger crude oil volumes sold during the fiscal year. Net sales of oil and gas for the year amounted to USD 137.9 million (2020: USD 76.7 million). 

Average net production for Pandion Energy was 5 152 boe per day (boepd), compared with an average of 5 639 boepd in 2020. The reduction in produced volumes was a result of planned downtime related to chalk influx in several wells necessitating well intervention activities.  

The board considers Pandion Energy to be well positioned for further growth. The company remains committed to its strategy of being an active and responsible partner on the NCS, participating in every phase from exploration through to the development of oil and gas resources. 

The invasion of Ukraine in February has had dramatic consequences which cannot be seen to the full extent at the time of writing this report. Beyond the devastating human suffering, consequences to the world economy and markets are likely to be expected. The extent to which the invasion impacts the company’s results will depend on future developments, which are highly uncertain and difficult to predict, including new information which may emerge on an ongoing basis.  

Pandion Energy Combined Annual Report 2021

The Nova field is expected to start production in the second half of 2022. The field, located in the northern part of the North Sea, is being developed with two subsea templates tied back to the existing Gjøa platform. Nova (previously Skarfjell) was discovered in 2012 and the plan for development and operation (PDO) was approved in 2018. The use of existing infrastructure enables effective extraction of the resources and Nova will be sustainably operated with hydro power from shore through Gjøa.

CEO of Pandion Energy, Jan Christian Ellefsen stated the following:

This transaction represents a new leap in the Pandion story and secures the foundation for further growth. Our asset base is strengthened and, with Nova on stream, our daily production will more than double.

“During the first five years, Pandion Energy has earned its reputation as a trusted partner in exploration and field development on the Norwegian Continental Shelf (NCS). ONE-Dyas Norge fits well with our existing portfolio and organisation and will strengthen our position as an active, full-cycle partner driving value in high-quality assets on the NCS.”

Through its 10 percent ownership in the Valhall and Hod fields, Pandion Energy currently produces over 5,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day, set to increase further as the new Hod B platform comes on stream in 2022. The Valhall area has been fully electrified from shore since 2013. The combined Valhall and Nova production will, in line with Pandion Energy’s Net Zero Carbon strategy, have among the lowest CO₂ intensity levels on the NCS.

Jan Christian Ellefsen further points out that Pandion Energy has long indicated plans for further expansion on the Norwegian Continental Shelf:

“M&A activity on the NCS was slow during the first half of 2021, but more opportunities started to occur as we approached 2022. We are still actively searching for and evaluating additional opportunities to further grow our portfolio.”

The transaction is subject to customary conditions for completion, including but not limited to approval by the Norwegian Ministry of Petroleum and Energy.

 

For more information on ONE-Dyas Norge AS, see: https://onedyas.no/

For more information on Nova, see: https://www.norskpetroleum.no/en/facts/field/nova/

The APA award was announced by the Ministry of Petroleum and Energy on Tuesday 18 January. For more information about the APA 2021 Licensing Round see Ministry of Petroleum and Energy’s website.

Pandion Energy has been awarded the following licenses:

License PL 1139 in block 15/6 is located in the South Viking Graben area in the Norwegian Sea.  Pandion Energy has been offered a 20 percent participating interest in PL 1139.

License PL 1166 in blocks 6507/8 and 9 is located in the Haltenbanken area of the Norwegian sea and is contiguous to PL 891 acquired by Pandion Energy in 2019. The PL 1166 area is planned to be matured alongside PL 891 where the partnership is currently preparing to drill the first appraisal well on the Slagugle discovery made in 2020. Pandion Energy has been offered a 30 percent participating interest in PL 1166.

License PL 263 G is additional acreage to PL 263 D/E/F located in the Norwegian Sea. The PL263 D/E/F license announced a gas discovery in exploration well 6407/1-8 S in November 2020. Pandion Energy holds a 20 percent interest in the license.

The Hod B platform is the second platform to be delivered under the fixed platform alliance including Aker BP, Aker Solutions and ABB.  The first normally unmanned platform delivered by the fixed platform alliance was Valhall Flank West, delivered in June 2019. Hod B is a copy.  Since acquiring a 10 percent share of the Valhall and Hod fields in December 2017,  Pandion Energy has worked closely together with the operator in further increasing the value creation through new projects and modernisation in the area.

“This is an important milestone in revitalising the Valhall and Hod area. We are very impressed with another successful achievement by the operator and the alliance partners on the delivered results so far and that while handling a pandemic. Congratulations go out to everyone involved,” says Jan Christian Ellefsen CEO of Pandion Energy.  

Effect of the temporary tax changes 

The first steel for Hod B was cut in Verdal, just hours after the Norwegian Parliament adopted temporary changes in the petroleum tax in June of last year. The tax changes were introduced to stimulate increased investments, and thus secure Norwegian jobs in an extremely demanding period for the oil and gas industry. 

More than a hundred suppliers across Norway have contributed to the Hod development. At peak, around 550 people from Aker Solutions, the alliance and subcontractors have been working on the Hod B project at the yard in Verdal. More than 50 apprentices have completed large parts of their vocational training on the project. The expertise acquired through the Hod project is also sought to be applied in upcoming renewable projects such as delivery of suction anchors and seabed installations for Hywind Tampen.     

Important for the future of Valhall 

Hod B will be remotely operated from Valhall, and the field will have extremely low CO2 emissions due to power from shore.  

Valhall has produced over one billion barrels since the field opened in 1982. The ambition is to produce another billion barrels during the next 40 years. Hod B is estimated to contribute with around 40 million barrels of oil equivalents.  

Several subsea campaigns will be conducted in the Hod project leading up to production start in 2022, such as installation and connection of the gas lift pipelines, production flowlines and umbilicals. Modification work is under way at the Valhall field centre, and the Maersk Invincible drilling rig will be arriving this autumn to drill production wells. 

For more information see press release from the Operator:  https://akerbp.com/en/hod-b-platform-safely-installed/

The wells were drilled about 8 kilometres northwest of 25/8-11 Ringhorne on the Balder field in the North Sea, about 200 kilometres west of Stavanger.

The 25/8-19 S (Iving) discovery was proven in 2019 in reservoir rocks from the Palaeocene (Heimdal Formation), the Early Jurassic (Statfjord Group), the Late Triassic (Skagerrak Formation) and in basement rock.

Before appraisal wells 25/8-21 S and 25/8-22 S were drilled, the operator’s resource estimate for the discovery was between 2 and 11 million standard cubic metres (Sm³) of recoverable oil equivalent in the Skagerrak formation.

The primary exploration target for well 25/8-21 S was to encounter the oil/water contact in sandstones in the Skagerrak Formation. The secondary exploration target was to evaluate the petroleum potential in the basement rock reservoir.

The primary exploration target for well 25/8-22 S was to evaluate the petroleum potential in sandstones in the lower part of the Statfjord Group and in the Skagerrak Formation. The secondary exploration target was to evaluate the petroleum potential in the Heimdal Formation and basement rock.

The results show that the appraisal wells will lead to a downward adjustment of the resource estimate in the Skagerrak Formation in 25/8-19 S (Iving), but it is still too early to give an updated estimate for the discovery.

The licensees will assess the results in the Skagerrak Formation in combination with other petroleum-bearing levels and discoveries in the area for further follow-up.

For more information see full press release from the Operator at the NPD webpage.

Wellify is the first product coming out of Cuttings Insight, a non-commercial collaboration project initiated by Pandion Energy in 2020, with DNO Norge AS and Spirit Energy Norway AS as partners and Itera ASA as technical provider. The launch of Wellify marks the end of a successful development and test period. The product is now daily in use with all three companies, demonstrating the rapid acceptance of new digital solutions when user driven. 

The idea behind Wellify was to provide the geoscientists with easy access to the high-resolution photos and mineral analysis coming from another joint industry collaboration project, namely the Released Well Initiative (RWI). With cuttings samples from more than 1,900 wells on the Norwegian continental shelf being digitalised, on average 300 – 400 samples per well, this project has created more than two million files and 30 terabytes of data.  

Bente Flakstad Vold, VP Exploration & Appraisal at Pandion Energy says:

Cuttings data has traditionally been an under-utilized and hidden data type. Wellify makes the digital cuttings data accessible and brings new valuable and insightful information about the subsurface.

Wellify provides instant and dynamic access to the photos and data from the Released Well Initiative. As all files are streamed through a cloud-based solution, users get immediate access without having to download large quantities of RWI data sets or to install and integrate a new software into existing systems. 

The project is currently enrolling new members and will enter the next development phase, further investigating additional functionality and potential uses of the data set from the Released Well Initiative.  

 

Read more about Wellify.

For more information regarding digitalisation in Pandion Energy and Cutting Insight contact: 

Helge Nordtorp 

(+47) 416 37 430 

helge.nordtorp@pandionenergy.no 

 

For a demonstration of Wellify contact: 

Bjørn Haugland 

(+47) 986 84 646 

bjorn.haugland@pandionenergy.no  

 

The Hod field will be developed with a normally unmanned installation (NUI), Hod B, which will be remotely operated from Valhall and run on power from shore, yielding close to zero CO2 emissions during normal operations. 

Hod is one of the first projects to be realised under the temporary changes to the Norwegian petroleum Tax Act introduced in June 2020 following the COVID-19 breakout. The field is expected to generate more than NOK 6 billion of tax revenues during its lifetime. Including ripple effects, the project is estimated to create around 5 000 man-years of employment during the execution phase. 75 per cent of the contract values for construction of the Hod B platform and subsea installations have gone to Norwegian supplier companies. 

Both the jacket and topsides are being built at Aker Solutions in Verdal, and the work has secured a number of jobs at the yard. The Hod B platform is being delivered by the fixed facilities alliance between the operator Aker BP, Aker Solutions and ABB. The alliance also successfully delivered the Valhall Flank West NUI in June 2019. 

Hod B is expected to contribute 40 million barrels of oil equivalent and will be important for Valhall to reach the ambition of a total of two billion produced barrels from the area. Production is scheduled to start in the first quarter of 2022.  

The Hod field has produced oil in the past from what was the first unmanned platform on the Norwegian continental shelf. The new Hod platform is a copy of Valhall Flank West. 

The Hod B topside is scheduled to sail from the Verdal yard in August. At the same time work is under way to plan remaining activities to complete the project. Multiple subsea campaigns will be conducted to install and connect the gas lift pipe, production flowline and umbilical. Integration work is under way on Valhall and the Maersk Invincible drilling rig is scheduled to start drilling production wells this autumn. 

Aker BP ASA is the operator of the Valhall and Hod fields. Pandion Energy AS holds 10% ownership interest in the Valhall area, including licenses PL006B, PL033 and PL033B.

Jan Christian Ellefsen, CEO of Pandion Energy, stated the following:

“The ongoing pandemic affected both operational priorities and financial progress in 2020. During these challenging times, our key priorities have revolved around ensuring the safety and well-being of our employees, protecting operations and, finally, ensuring that Pandion Energy maintains a solid financial platform.

Our priorities will continue to revolve around ensuring the safety and wellbeing of our employees, protecting our operations, and securing a solid financial position until the Covid-19 situation has normalised.

Operationally, our strongest priority is to deliver production and continue developing the Valhall and Hod fields and progress the appraisal of the recent discoveries. This alongside maturing related upside potential and further developing our exploration portfolio.”

Pandion Energy’s revenues and other income for 2020 amounted to USD 116.6 million (2019: USD 125.1 million) and comprised net sales of oil and gas, gains from the sale of interests in licences and gain/loss from hedging positions.

Average net production for Pandion Energy was 5,639 boe per day (boepd), compared with an average of 4,334 boepd in 2019, driven by new Valhall infill wells and Valhall Flank West coming on stream during the year.

The board of Pandion Energy continues to monitor the situation related to the coronavirus pandemic closely.

In 2020, Pandion Energy was one of the first E&P companies in Norway to become carbon neutral for Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and announced a strategy in early 2021 for maintaining its position with a low carbon impact and net zero status.

The board considers Pandion Energy to be well positioned for further growth. The company remains committed to its strategy of being an active and responsible partner, participating in all phases of oil and gas resources on the NCS.

Pandion Energy Annual Report 2020