Snøhvit Oil Field
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Snøhvit ''( en, Snow White)'' is the name of a
natural gas field A petroleum reservoir or oil and gas reservoir is a subsurface accumulation of hydrocarbons contained in porous or fractured rock formations. Such reservoirs form when kerogen (ancient plant matter) is created in surrounding rock by the presence ...
in the
Norwegian Sea The Norwegian Sea ( no, Norskehavet; is, Noregshaf; fo, Norskahavið) is a marginal sea, grouped with either the Atlantic Ocean or the Arctic Ocean, northwest of Norway between the North Sea and the Greenland Sea, adjoining the Barents Sea to ...
, situated northwest of
Hammerfest Hammerfest (; sme, Hámmerfeasta ) is a municipality in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. Hammerfest is the northernmost town in the world with more than 10,000 inhabitants. The administrative centre of the municipality is the town of Hammerfe ...
,
Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...
. The northern part of the Norwegian Sea is often described as the Barents Sea by offshore petroleum companies. ''Snøhvit'' is also the name of a development of ''Snøhvit'' and the two neighbouring natural gas fields ''Albatross'' and ''Askeladden''. Estimated recoverable reserves are 193 billion cubic metres of
natural gas Natural gas (also called fossil gas or simply gas) is a naturally occurring mixture of gaseous hydrocarbons consisting primarily of methane in addition to various smaller amounts of other higher alkanes. Low levels of trace gases like carbo ...
, of condensate (light oil), and 5.1 million tonnes of
natural gas liquids Natural-gas condensate, also called natural gas liquids, is a low-density mixture of hydrocarbon liquids that are present as gaseous components in the raw natural gas produced from many natural gas fields. Some gas species within the raw natur ...
(NGL). The development comprises 21 wells. The Snøhvit development is operated by
Equinor Equinor ASA (formerly Statoil and StatoilHydro) is a Norwegian state-owned multinational energy company headquartered in Stavanger. It is primarily a petroleum company, operating in 36 countries with additional investments in renewable energy. I ...
on behalf of six gas companies owning licenses: *
Petoro Petoro is a company that is wholly owned by the Government of Norway. Established in 2001, it manages the Government's portfolio—collectively called State's Direct Financial Interest (SDFI)—of exploration and production licenses for p ...
*
TotalEnergies TotalEnergies SE is a French Multinational corporation, multinational integrated energy and List of oil exploration and production companies, petroleum company founded in 1924 and one of the seven Big Oil, supermajor oil companies. Its businesses ...
*
GDF Suez Engie SA is a French multinational utility company, headquartered in La Défense, Courbevoie, which operates in the fields of energy transition, electricity generation and distribution, natural gas, nuclear, renewable energy and petroleum. ...
*
Equinor Equinor ASA (formerly Statoil and StatoilHydro) is a Norwegian state-owned multinational energy company headquartered in Stavanger. It is primarily a petroleum company, operating in 36 countries with additional investments in renewable energy. I ...
*
Hess Hess or Heß may refer to: * Hess (surname), also ''Heß'' in German, people with the surname Hess * Hess, Oklahoma, a community in the United States * Hess Educational Organization, the largest private provider of English instruction in the Repub ...
*
RWE Dea DEA Deutsche Erdoel AG was an international oil and gas company headquartered in Hamburg, Germany. It was a subsidiary of L1 Energy. In 2018, DEA owned stakes in oil and gas licenses in various countries and operated natural gas underground storage ...
The fields were discovered in 1984. The development plan was presented by Statoil in 2001. A subsea production system is planned to feed a land-based plant on the island of
Melkøya Melkøya ( sme, Muolkkut) is an island in Hammerfest Municipality in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. The island is connected to the town of Hammerfest (on the neighboring island of Kvaløya to the west) by the Melkøysund Tunnel which was co ...
via long submarine gas pipeline with diameter of . The gas from Snøhvit will be used for
liquefied natural gas Liquefied natural gas (LNG) is natural gas (predominantly methane, CH4, with some mixture of ethane, C2H6) that has been cooled down to liquid form for ease and safety of non-pressurized storage or transport. It takes up about 1/600th the volu ...
(LNG) production. The total costs of field development will be around NOK 34.2 billion. The LNG plant will emit 920 thousand tonnes of each year, an increase of Norway's total emissions by almost 2%. The annual export capacity is 5.75 billion cubic metres of LNG, 747 thousand tonnes of condensate and 247 thousand tonnes of
liquified petroleum gas Liquefied petroleum gas (LPG or LP gas) is a fuel gas which contains a flammable mixture of hydrocarbon gases, specifically propane, propylene, butylene, isobutane and n-butane. LPG is used as a fuel gas in heating appliances, cooking equ ...
. Long-term export contracts have been signed with
Iberdrola Iberdrola () is a Spanish multinational electric utility company based in Bilbao, Spain. Iberdrola has a workforce of around 34,000 employees serving around 31.67 million customers. Subsidiaries include Scottish Power (United Kingdom) ...
in Spain and
El Paso El Paso (; "the pass") is a city in and the seat of El Paso County in the western corner of the U.S. state of Texas. The 2020 population of the city from the U.S. Census Bureau was 678,815, making it the 23rd-largest city in the U.S., the s ...
in the USA. There are also limited amounts of
crude oil Petroleum, also known as crude oil, or simply oil, is a naturally occurring yellowish-black liquid mixture of mainly hydrocarbons, and is found in geological formations. The name ''petroleum'' covers both naturally occurring unprocessed crude ...
in this field. The recent discovery of the nearby Goliat oil field has made the oil reserves at Snøhvit more exploitable. The development of Snøhvit sparked political controversy in Norway, as it was the first discovery in the
Barents Sea The Barents Sea ( , also ; no, Barentshavet, ; russian: Баренцево море, Barentsevo More) is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean, located off the northern coasts of Norway and Russia and divided between Norwegian and Russian territo ...
to be developed. Environmental groups like
Natur og Ungdom Natur og Ungdom (NU) which translates Nature and Youth, also known in English as Young Friends of the Earth Norway, is a Norwegian youth environment protecting organisation. It is the only environmentalist youth organisation in Norway. 7,000 memb ...
and
Bellona Bellona may refer to: Places *Bellona, Campania, a ''comune'' in the Province of Caserta, Italy *Bellona Reef, a reef in New Caledonia *Bellona Island, an island in Rennell and Bellona Province, Solomon Islands Ships * HMS ''Bellona'' (1760), a 74 ...
argued that the Barents Sea is too sensitive for oil and gas production, and that the Melkøya LNG plant would drastically increase Norway's emissions. In the summer of 2002 protesters from
Natur og Ungdom Natur og Ungdom (NU) which translates Nature and Youth, also known in English as Young Friends of the Earth Norway, is a Norwegian youth environment protecting organisation. It is the only environmentalist youth organisation in Norway. 7,000 memb ...
were arrested by the police after blocking the construction of the LNG plant at Melkøya for 10 days.


Geology

The reservoir resides in three fault blocks located in the Hammerfest Basin and consists of Lower to Middle
Jurassic The Jurassic ( ) is a Geological period, geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system that spanned from the end of the Triassic Period million years ago (Mya) to the beginning of the Cretaceous Period, approximately Mya. The J ...
sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) ...
s.Linjordet, A., Grung Olsen, R., The Jurassic Snohvit Gas Field, Hammerfest Basin, Offshore Northern Norway, 1992, in ''Giant Oil and Gas Fields of the Decade, 1978-1988'', AAPG Memoir 54, Halbouty, M.T., editor, Tulsa: American Association of Petroleum Geologists, , pp. 349-370


See also

*
Energy in Norway Norway is a large energy producer, and one of the world's largest exporters of oil. Most of the electricity in the country is produced by hydroelectricity. Norway is one of the leading countries in the electrification of its transport sector, wi ...
*
Carbon capture and storage Carbon capture and storage (CCS) or carbon capture and sequestration is the process of capturing carbon dioxide (CO2) before it enters the atmosphere, transporting it, and storing it (carbon sequestration) for centuries or millennia. Usually th ...
*
Noweco {{Infobox company , name = Norwegian Welding Control AS , logo = Noweco.png , logo_size = 143px , type = Private , foundation = 1990 , location_city = Harstad , location_country = Norway , key_people = Hans-Peder Olsen, CEO , industry = Industry ...


References


External links


Snøhvit in Aftenbladet Energi Interactive Energy Map
{{DEFAULTSORT:Snohvit Hammerfest Natural gas fields in Norway Natural gas fields in the Arctic Ocean Barents Sea