Valaris has secured a contract with Neptune Energy to supply a jack-up rig to carry out development drilling work on the British operator’s Seagull oilfield project in the UK North Sea.
The rig Valaris JU-248, formerly named Rowan Gorilla VI, will be used to drill four firm development wells under a planned 18-month campaign due to start in the third quarter of 2020.
No value was disclosed for the contract, with the jack-up presently working for Shell off Trinidad & Tobago under a charter due to expire at the end of next month.
The high-pressure and high-temperature Seagull discovery, located in licence P1622 in the central North Sea, is being developed as a subsea tie-back to the BP-operated ETAP central processing facility, partly using existing subsea infrastructure that would otherwise have been decommissioned.
TechnipFMC was earlier this year awarded an integrated contract to deliver both the subsea production system and umbilicals, risers and flowlines for the project, which is due on stream by the end of 2021.
The Seagull field development, which was approved by the UK’s Oil & Gas Authority in March this year, aims to exploit proven and probable reserves of 50 million barrels of oil equivalent.
Seagull is expected to produce about 50,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day over its projected 10-year lifespan.
Gas from the development will come onshore at the CATS processing terminal at Teesside, while oil will come onshore through the Forties Pipeline System to the Kinneil terminal, Grangemouth.
Neptune operates the field with a 35% stake, alongside partners BP and Japex with 50% and 15%, respectively.
