The cost of taking down oil rigs is dropping
The price of decommissioning the UK’s oil and gas infrastructure is dropping as engineers become more efficient, new figures show.
The Oil and Gas authority said the cost of future decommissioning fell to £51bn in 2019, from £59.7bn in 2017. It came even as the OGA expects operators will take down more assets and infrastructure.
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Meanwhile, the like-for-like decommissioning cost fell 17 per cent to £49bn.
“Better capability and experience is providing greater certainty of actual UK decommissioning costs with several operators already achieving significant cost savings through adopting different approaches, learning and sharing with others, and challenging previous norms,” said Nils Cohrs, the Oil and Gas Authority’s head of decommissioning.
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He added: “The supply chain is also bringing new solutions to the market in terms of pricing structures, business models and technology.”
The news brings the UK half way towards meeting a 2017 target to reduce the cost by 35 per cent.