Decommissioning Insight 2018

DECOMMISSIONING INSIGHT 2018

Northern North Sea and West of Shetland

Figure 18: Well Decommissioning Activity in the Northern North Sea and West of Shetland

100

Suspended Subsea E&A Wells Subsea Development Platform

90

80

70

60

50

40

30

20

Number of Wells to be Decommissioned

10

0

2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025 2026 2027

Source: Oil & Gas UK, OGA

Number of Wells

Percentage PlatformWells

391

51%

In the northern North Sea and west of Shetland, 201 platform wells, 160 subsea wells and 30 suspended E&A wells are forecast to be decommissioned over the next 10 years.

Similar to the trends shown in the central North Sea, forecast activity in this sector has also fallen. In addition, this year’s data suggest that planned activities have now been spread over many years, rather than allotted arbitrarily into a single period. This indicates a more realistic approach is being adopted for well decommissioning projects compared with last year and suggests that operators may have refined estimates and smoothed their decommissioning spend profiles over the period.

40