By Martin Kelly
A new oil field has been discovered in the Scottish sector of the North Sea it has been announced.
Premier Oil confirmed the find at their Bonneville exploration well just south of the Catcher discoveries, 150 km off the shore of Aberdeen.
The quality of crude is described as “excellent” and volumes are believed to be in the region of 30 million barrels.
Simon Lockett, chief executive of Premier, said: “We are delighted with the strong start to our 2013 exploration drilling programme,”
News of the find comes as investment in the North Sea oil and gas sector is reaching record levels. Newly published analysis recently released by the Scottish government predicts that a “renewed oil boom” will lead to an average of £48bn of revenue over the next six years.
The latest forecasts by Oil and Gas UK suggest that production could reach the equivalent of 2 million barrels a day by 2017. This would represent a 30% increase on current production levels.
Analysis published by Professor Alex Kemp in November 2012 also projected that production could rise in the years to 2017 under a number of different scenarios.
Professor Kemp recently appeared in a special BBC online interview where he answered questions on North Sea oil.
