Subsea World News has put together a recap of the most interesting articles from the previous week (February 15 – February 21).

Norway’s Statoil has reportedly given up on constructing a new platform to develop its Snorre 2040 project offshore Norway for a subsea solution which should cut costs, help improve recovery and extend the lifetime of the North Sea field.

According to Bjarne Bakken, head of Snorre 2040 project, the so-called improved oil recovery (IOR) with a platform development has proved to be very economically demanding.

Aker Solutions and Total agreed to collaborate on research and innovation to develop new cost-effective subsea field technology.

The initial technical collaboration agreement is for four years and will build on earlier cooperation of the companies.

Forsys Subsea has been awarded a contract from Statoil to provide a subsea front-end engineering and design (FEED) study for subsea tie-back of Trestakk to Åsgard A FPSO.

The scope of work includes all systems and related services from the wellhead to Åsgard A riser hang-off, including umbilicals, riser, flowlines and subsea production system, installed and made ready for operation.

Oil services company Subsea 7 has renewed a contract with Norwegian cranes and lifting operations specialist Westcon Løfteteknikk (WCL), adding 5 years to existing framework agreement.

Over the last three years the framework agreement has seen WCL provide operation of Subsea 7’s own pool of lifting equipment, expert inspection, as well as the sale and rental of lifting equipment.

Douglas-Westwood’s new North Sea Decommissioning Market Forecast 2016-2040 predicts that between 2016 and 2040 $70-$82 billion will be spent on decommissioning activity in Denmark, Germany, Norway and the UK.

DW anticipates growth in decommissioning activity over the next few years, driven by the sustained low oil price, the maturity of North Sea fields and the age of infrastructure that has pushed maintenance costs up, leading to a high breakeven price.