OMV announces oil discovery in the Barents Sea

September 6, 2013 - 09:00 am (CET)

• OMV operated Wisting Central exploration well succeeds in an oil discovery
• Exploration concept confirmed and new play fairway opened
• Hoop High area in the Barents Sea with significant potential

OMV, the integrated international oil and gas company has found oil in the Barents Sea. The exploration success has been made in the exploration licenses PL 537 which was signed in 2009. Jaap Huijskes, OMV Executive Board Member responsible for Exploration and Production: “We are very pleased with this exploration success. This discovery with exciting follow-up potential will significantly contribute to OMV’s long term organic growth in Northern Europe. It is another important step after the recently announced transaction with Statoil which includes interests in the fields Gullfaks and Gudrun.”

OMV (Norge) AS, operator of exploration license PL 537, is about to complete drilling operations on wildcat well 7324/8-1, Wisting Central. The presence of oil was proven through wireline logging, wireline testing and coring. The well was drilled to a vertical depth of 905 meters below sea level; water depth at the site is 373 meters. The well will be permanently plugged and abandoned.

The objective of the well was to confirm the exploration concept and to prove hydrocarbons in middle to lower Jurassic reservoir rocks of the Upper Realgrunnen Subgroup on the Hoop High area, which so far has not seen any exploration drilling. The well results are a breakthrough for the regional exploration activities as the presence of good quality oil shows the possible large potential of an area, which will see more exploration drilling in the near future. OMV has as a joint venture partner interests in three additional licenses in the Hoop High area. Further exploration drilling in one of the other licenses is expected for 2014.

Preliminary estimates place the size of the discovery for the drilled segment between 60 and
160 mn bbl of recoverable oil, and 10 to 40 bn cf of recoverable gas. Considering equivalent segments, immediately adjacent to the first one, recoverable oil volumes for the total of PL 537 are seen in a size order of 200 to 500 mn boe. Further drilling is needed to confirm the full license potential; a second well – Wisting Main – pursuing a different, deeper target will be spud immediately after Wisting Central and is expected to contribute valuable information.

OMV (Norge) AS as operator has a 25% share in the exploration license; our joint venture partners are Petoro, Idemitsu,Tullow (each 20%) and Statoil (15%).

Background information:

OMV in Norway
OMV (Norge) AS is a wholly owned subsidiary of OMV Exploration & Production GmbH, established in 2006 and headquartered in Stavanger. OMV (Norge) AS is partner in the ongoing field development projects Aasta Hansteen, Zidane, Edvard Grieg and in the Polarled infrastructure project and focuses its exploration activities in the more frontier areas of the Northern Norwegian Sea and the Barents Sea. OMV (Norge) AS currently has interests in 23 licenses: 11 in the Barents Sea, 11 in the Norwegian Sea and one in the North Sea; nine licenses are operated by OMV.

OMV Aktiengesellschaft
With Group sales of EUR 42.65 bn and a workforce of around 29,000 employees in 2012, OMV Aktiengesellschaft is Austria’s largest listed industrial company. In Exploration and Production, OMV is active in two core countries Romania and Austria and holds a balanced international portfolio. OMV had proven oil and gas reserves of approximately 1.12 bn boe as of year-end 2012 and a production of around 303,000 boe/d in 2012. In Gas and Power, OMV sold approximately 437 TWh of gas in 2012. In Austria, OMV operates a 2,000 km long gas pipeline network with a marketed capacity of around 103 bcm in 2012. With a trading volume of around 528 TWh, OMV’s gas trading platform, the Central European Gas Hub, is amongst the most important hubs in Continental Europe. In Refining and Marketing, OMV has an annual refining capacity of 22 mn t and as of the end of 2012 approximately 4,400 filling stations in 13 countries including Turkey. OMV further strengthened its position through the ownership of a 97% stake in Petrol Ofisi, Turkey’s leading company in the retail and commercial business.

For further information, please contact:

OMV Media Relations:
Johannes Vetter, Tel,: +43 1 40440 22729, e-mail: johannes.vetter@omv.com
Robert Lechner, Tel.: +43 1 40440 21472, e-mail: robert.lechner@omv.com 

OMV Investor Relations:
Felix Rüsch, Tel.: +43 1 40440 21600, e-mail: investor.relations@omv.com

Web: www.omv.com
 
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