Independent review for Duva Development
Background
Neptune Energy is an independent E&P company with a regional focus on the North Sea, North Africa and Asia-Pacific. One of Neptune’s significant assets is the Duva (formerly known as Cara) discovery in Norway, where Neptune is the operator. Reserves at Duva are estimated to be 88 million barrels and it will be developed as a sub-sea tie-back to Gjøa. Before submitting the Plan for Development, Neptune and the other licence partners Idemitsu, Pandion and Wellesley wanted an external party to conduct an independent cold-eye review. The objective of the review was to assure that the necessary preparations were in place to pass Decision Gate 3 (take Final Investment Decision). H&G was engaged by Neptune Energy to conduct this DG3 review.
Developing offshore fields in this increasingly volatile market with significant cost pressures has become more challenging. A cold-eye review of all aspects of a development at each decision gate assists investors in securing that nothing that matters is missing.
Per-Olaf Hustad, Senior Partner, Hustad & Granaas
How H&G helped
A key objective for H&G is to disturb a project team as little as possible during a review. Therefore no specific preparations were requested. The review was based on the H&G’s in-house “Basis for Review” that was shared and agreed with Neptune up front. H&G collected the necessary information from existing documentation supported by only one day of interviews with the project team. The client valued the minimum disturbance of the project team. While H&G was flexible in adapting to the customer available material, it stayed true to the objectives of the review. A comprehensive summary report with key observations and recommendations was produced within two days. Including the licence partners views ensured their requirements to the review were covered. The result was that all parties supported the investment decision. The tie-back was approved by authorities and started production in 2021.