By OGJ editors
HOUSTON, Dec. 11 -- Norsk Hydro SA, development operator of Ormen Lange natural gas field on deepwater Block 6305/5-1 in the Norwegian Sea, has concluded a new agreement with Statoil ASA that gives Statoil responsibility for procurement and delivery of steel line pipe, anodes, and pipeline coating for proposed pipelines from the field to a processing and export plant at Nyhamna, Norway.
The new agreement covers 120 km of large diameter, dual gas pipelines and two monoethylene glycol lines of the same length. A separate 3.5-km, insulated monoethylene glycol line also will be installed between two of the subsea templates planned for the field.
The pipelines between Ormen Lange and Nyhamna must be weighted at the more shallow part of the route and insulated for the deep sections in 850 m of water, Statoil said.
The contracts are in addition to Statoil's existing agreements for planning and constructing the 44-in. gas export pipeline from Nyhamna to the Sleipner riser platform in the North Sea and from Sleipner to Easington on the UK east coast. (OGJ Online, Oct. 3, 2003). Contractor Stolt Offshore SA will lay the first segment to Sleipner and has an option to construct the Sleipner-Easington segment as well (OGJ Online, Dec. 5, 2003).
Ormen Lange is scheduled to come on stream in October 2007, when AS Norsk Shell, a unit of Royal Dutch/Shell, will become production operator. The field's estimated gas reserves are 375 billion cu m of dry gas and 138 million bbl of condensate (OGJ Online, Dec. 23, 2002).
