Neptune Energy welcomed the announcement from its partner, Equinor, on the successful oil and gas discovery near the Fram field in the Norwegian sector of the North Sea.

Neptune holds a 15 per cent share in the discovery, which is situated within the Equinor-operated Fram licence area.

Neptune Energy’s Managing Director in Norway and the UK, Odin Estensen, said: “We congratulate Equinor for their safe and successful drilling operation, which again proves the potential in the highly prolific Fram area. Its close proximity to existing infrastructure provides potential opportunities for for a low emission, cost-efficient development.”

Preliminary estimates of the size of the discovery are between 1.5 and 5.5 million standard cubic metres (Sm3) of recoverable oil equivalents, or about 9 – 35 million barrels of oil equivalent (mboe). The licensees consider the discovery to be commercially viable and will consider the potential tie-in to other recent discoveries in the area, via existing infrastructure.

The wells were drilled by the Deepsea Stavanger drilling facility, and extensive data acquisition and sampling has been carried out.

Water depth at the site is 356 metres.