Utsira High, Norway

The Utsira High Power Hub Project in Norway has continuously expanded the power from shore capabilities during the last decade to reduce the carbon emissions from the offshore operations.

The Utsira High area, located 160 km off the coast of Stavanger, gathers six offshore energy production fields on the Norwegian continental shelf. All along the development and addition of platforms, the aim has been to electrify operations. By replacing fossil fueled generators with power from shore electrical power cable systems it is now possible to operate the connected platforms using renewable energy transmitted from the onshore grid. This has enabled significant reduction in greenhouse gas emissions and paves the way for reaching climate ambitions including the goal for net zero emissions by 2050. Powering offshore platforms with cables from shore are also considered safer and more energy-efficient.

During the last decade Equinor and Aker BP have implemented the electrification of the connected platforms as part of the Utsira High Power Hub Project. NKT were involved from the start with the submarine cable to Gudrun offshore platform in 2011. The Johan Sverdrup field receives power from shore through cables from Haugsneset north of Stavanger. The first DC cable system currently supplies the first four platforms on the Johan Sverdrup field with electricity. An additional platform at Johan Sverdrup was constructed and connected to shore with two more DC cables. Another DC cable system that now supplies the fifth platform and the rest of Utsira High installations.

NKT's key contributing projects are turnkey cable systems to Johan Sverdrup 1 and 2 and from there continuing to Edvard Grieg, Gina Krog, Gudrun, Ivar Aasen and Sleipner platforms.

NKT contributed with expertise in design, manufacturing and offshore installation. All cables were produced in our high voltage cable factory in Karlskrona, Sweden. For Johan Sverdrup we delivered the world’s longest extruded DC submarine cables without offshore field joints, 2 x 200 km. Using our state-of-the-art cable laying vessel NKT Victoria we successfully installed five of the seven projects under challenging conditions including operations in close proximity to offshore platforms as well as cable laying adjacent to significant amounts of existing infrastructure on the seabed. The remaining two projects were successfully installed by other marine contractors.

Onshore converter stations turns the power into DC and transmits it to the Johan Sverdrup platforms where it is converted back into AC and distributed to the rest of the platforms.

Due to a great teamwork with the customers and subcontractors we managed to bring the projects safely to the finish line, without incidents or accidents, and performed all installations on time and cost, even during the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic during 2020-2021. In 2022 we finalized the last submarine pull-ins to the distribution platform, bringing the power system online.

The completed DC links have a combined capacity of 400 megawatts (MW). This reduces CO2 emissions by a total of 1.2 million tonnes per year and is equivalent to 2.5 percent of Norway’s annual emissions in 2022. NKT is proud to have enabled and supported Equinor and Aker BP to the maximum utilization of power from shore capacity in the Utsira High area.