Marigold Oilfield Development, North Sea, UK

The Marigold oilfield is located within Block 15/13a of Production Licence P198 in the North Sea, UK.

The field is part of the Marigold cluster comprising the Marigold East, Marigold West, and Sunflower fields.

Anasuria Hibiscus UK (AHUK), a wholly owned subsidiary of Malaysian oil and gas company Hibiscus Petroleum, holds an 87.5% interest in Block 15/13a, which contains the Marigold West field, while the remaining 12.5% is held by Caldera Petroleum UK. Ithaca Oil and Gas holds a 100% interest in Block 15/18b, which contains the Marigold East field.

In September 2023, AHUK, Caldera Petroleum, and Ithaca entered into a unitisation and unit operating agreement to jointly develop the  Marigold West and Marigold East fields. AHUK owns 61.25% interest in the unitised Marigold field while Ithaca holds 30% and Caldera Petroleum holds 8.75% interest.

The field development plan (FDP) is scheduled to be submitted in 2024 and the field is expected to begin production in 2028.

The Marigold oilfield is projected to have a peak production capacity of 40,000 barrels of oil per day and 12 million standard cubic metres of gas per day.

Location and reserves

The Marigold oilfield lies at a water depth of approximately 140m in Block 15/13a, approximately 250km north-east of Aberdeen in the central North Sea.

The Sunflower field lies north-east of Block 15/13a. Other assets in the Marigold cluster include Teal West, Crown, and Kildrummy.

The Marigold cluster is estimated to contain 43.6 million barrels of undeveloped 2C resources.

Marigold oilfield development background

AHUK acquired a 50% interest in blocks 15/13a and 15/13b covering the oil-bearing Marigold and Sunflower fields from Caldera Petroleum in October 2018.

The company submitted a concept select report to the UK Oil and Gas Authority (OGA) for the development of the Marigold and Sunflower fields in August 2019. A no-objection letter for the selected concept was received in October 2019.

An FDP for the Marigold project, including the Marigold and Sunflower fields, was submitted to the OGA in December 2020.

The environmental impact assessment and environmental statement were submitted to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.

In 2021, AHUK increased its interest in Marigold and Sunflower to 87.5%.

The company also acquired a 100% interest in Licence P2366 (blocks 15/18d and 15/19b) containing the Crown discovery from United Oil & Gas and Swift Exploration in December 2019.

It executed the licence agreement for a 100% interest in block 15/17a comprising the Kildrummy discovery, located 8km from Marigold, in January 2021.

British oil and gas company Ithaca Energy acquired Production Licence P2158 containing block 15/18b from Total E&P UK in February 2020.

The acquired licence comprises the Yeoman discovery (renamed Marigold East) and the southern extent of the Marigold discovery.

Marigold oilfield development details

The Marigold field is planned to be developed through nine subsea wells tied back to the Repsol-operated Piper Bravo platform.

The platform will provide gas lift, processing, and transportation services. The produced oil will be exported to the Flotta oil terminal located in the Orkney Islands.

The Sunflower field will be developed as a subsea tie-in to the Marigold project’s infrastructure, which is expected to facilitate various potential discoveries in block Q.

Piper Bravo platform details

Piper Bravo is a 57,800-tonne eight-legged fixed steel jacket platform.

Installed in 1992, the platform separates production from the Piper, Saltire, Chanter, Iona, and Tweedsmuir reservoirs into oil, natural gas liquid. and dry gas.

Contractors involved

TechnipFMC, an energy technology company, and Petrofac, an energy services business, conducted prefront end engineering and design studies for the project in May 2022.