The boss of Premier Oil has said he is “delighted” with a commercial discovery at the firm’s Tolmount East well in the Southern North Sea.
Tony Durrant, chief executive of Premier Oil, confirmed the oil and gas firm had been successful in discovering gas in the well located in an undrilled area more than two miles east of the 500 BCF Tolmount gas field.
The firm was was targeting 220 BCF of P50 gross resource.
Premier Oil hold a 50% stake in Tolmount East with Dana Petroleum, who hold the remaining 50%.
Mr Durrant said: “We are delighted with this commercial discovery at Tolmount East, the development of which will add significant value to our UK portfolio.
“Elsewhere in the Greater Tolmount Area, we are making excellent progress with our sanctioned Tolmount development which remains on schedule for first gas by the end of next year and will add a net 20,000 to 25,000 boepd to Group production.”
Aberdeen firm Dana Petroleum, which holds the 50% non-operating interesting in Tolmount East, said: “Dana welcomes the announcement of the well result
and looks forward to working with our partner Premier Oil to further evaluate the discovery.”
Premier said data will now be integrated with new 3D seismic datasets as part of the “fast-track development planning” for Tolmount East.
Mr Durrant added the work is “already well advanced” ahead of the project sanction, targeted for the second half of 2020.
He claimed the find has “positive implications” for other targets within the Greater Tolmount area.
Premier Oil has began drilling at Tolmount East in August.
The Ensco 123 rig was contracted to drill the appraisal well which spudded on August 8, according to information on the Oil and Gas Authority website.
Tolmount East has the potential to “add significantly” to the wider Tolmount field which contains approximately 520billion cubic feet of gas and is due for production in the fourth quarter of 2020.
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