US Technology Considered for North Sea Fields

The UK Government could soon invest in US technology to extract more oil from mature fields in the North Sea, it was announced today.

Energy Minister Malcolm Wicks will visit US oil and gas company Denbury Resources in a bid investigate the company's Enhanced Oil Recovery technology.

The technique involves extracting carbon dioxide from an extinct volcano, before it is pressurised and used to force out oil.

"CO2 injection has the benefits of recovering significant oil reserves from mature reservoirs that would not otherwise be recovered and the future opportunity to sequester large volumes of man-made CO2 into known reservoir traps," says of Denbury Resources President and CEO Gareth Roberts.

Wicks, who believes there is still an "estimated 25 billion barrels of oil equivalent left to exploit" in the North Sea, says full recovery is going to become increasingly challenging, requiring "innovative technologies".

The process could produce a further 17 percent of oil from maturing reserves, says the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform.

By Ozge Ibrahim