Marathon reports first oil from Alvheim

Marathon Oil Corporation, through its wholly owned subsidiary Marathon Petroleum Norge AS, announced with its partners that the Alvheim development offshore Norway has achieved first production. The Company expects the combined Alvheim and Vilje projects to reach peak net production of approximately 75,000 barrels of oil equivalent (boe) per day by early 2009.

Alvheim is a new oil hub for the Norwegian Continental Shelf; and along with nearby satellite fields, it will contribute significantly to Marathon’s defined production growth profile through 2012 and beyond, said David E. Roberts, Jr., Marathon executive vice president of Upstream. With the commissioning of this significant floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel, we are now focused on ramping up production and maximizing the full resource potential of our holdings in the region.

The Alvheim and Vilje developments are estimated to contain gross resources of approximately 250 million boe. Marathon has a 65 percent interest in the Alvheim fields and serves as operator. Marathon holds a non-operated 46.9 percent interest in the Vilje field, a subsea development tie back to Alvheim.

Source : http://www.marathon.com/