Statoils plans for the Byrding development include a duo-lateral well drilled from the FAram H-Nord subsea template.

Statoil earlier released a statement indicating that capital expenditures are estimated at around NOK 1 billion (£92.97m) with recoverable volumes of around 11 million BOE.

Statoil’s Senior Vice President for Project Development, Torget Rød said “This is another example of a new discovery being realised through existing infrastructure.”

“Byrding shows that successful improvement efforts in Statoil, and in this case particularly within drilling and well, allow new development projects to be realised,”

Oil and gas from Byrding will be piped to Mongstad and Kollnes respectively via the subsea template to Troll C.

The capital expenditure (Capex) on the project has been massively reduced from NOK 3.5 billion (£325.38m) to the current estimate of approximately NOK 1 billion (£92.97 million).

Statoil Executive Torget Rød clarified that: “Combined with the use of an available well slot in existing subsea template, this reduces the costs of the project substantially. The project is profitable also in the current oil price environment,”

The well will be 4.34 miles long with the first miles being shared by the two laterals of the well.

If all goes to plan, the development should be online in the third quarter of 2017 with expectations of an eight to ten year lifespan.

“Byrding will add new profitable volumes from the Troll/Fram area, boosting the activity and production on the Troll C platform,” Statoil’s senior vice president for Operations West, Gunnar Nakken, said.