Money machine
The field was discovered in 1984 in a highly permeable structure which has since proved to be an extremely productive reservoir. It soon became a candidate for development at a time when new discoveries had to queue up to secure official authorisation.
The Norwegian government had only opened the Norwegian Sea to oil and gas operations relatively recently, and a number of partnerships were drilling wildcats in the area.
Many groups had been against extending exploration to new areas of the Norwegian continental shelf (NCS), and thereby crossing the barrier represented earlier by the 62nd parallel.
This opposition reflected fears – which have since proved groundless – that the rich fisheries in the Halten Bank area could be harmed.
In fact, the fishing and petroleum industries have demonstrated that they are able coexist harmoniously in the Norwegian Sea.
When Draugen began producing oil on 19 October 1993, it was expected to yield almost entirely oil – some 430 million barrels or 68 million standard cubic metres of oil equivalent (scm oe).[REMOVE]Fotnote: Norwegian Petroleum Directorate, Facts, 1983.
Since then, the recoverable amount has been increased to about 140 million scm oe.[REMOVE]Fotnote: Norwegian Petroleum Directorate website, fact pages fields, 1 October 2018.
store verdier, graf,Operator A/S Norske Shell has also made changes to its production facilities over these years.
The upshot of these alterations is that daily output has been significantly increased since the field first came on stream. Read more about capacity increases and updating.
Figure 1. Annual production peaked in 2001, the year after gas output and export was included.[REMOVE]Fotnote: Norwegian Petroleum Directorate website, fact pages fields, 1 October 2018
Figure 2. Draugen has produced assets worth almost NOK 250 billion in all since 1993. These revenues are calculated on the basis of a production profile obtained from the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate’s fact pages in the autumn of 2018 and an annual average oil price taken daily from Norwegian business newspaper Dagens Næringsliv.
store verdier, graf,