Ormen Lange pipeline to be tested with Sleipner gas

Tue, 20 March 2007

THE pipeline that will connect Norway’s new Ormen Lange gasfield to the existing Langeled pipeline, which currently supplies Norwegian gas to the UK, will be filled and tested with gas from Norway’s Sleipner gas field, Norwegian gas network operator Gassco said on 9 March. “The line will be packed with gas from Sleipner because they need gas to start-up Ormen Lange,” Jan Hauge, executive president of product management at Gassco, said.

The testing is expected to commence in late summer. By filling the Ormen Lange pipeline with gas from Sleipner, field operator Norsk Hydro ASA will be able to conduct some testing of the pipeline's other field infrastructure at Ormen Lange before the field goes into production, Gassco spokesman Kjell Varlo Larsen said. A spokesman for Royal Dutch Shell, who will operate the Ormen Lange field once production begins, said the date of first production from the field is yet to be confirmed.