Faroe Petroleum, an independent oil and gas company, has drawn a blank on the first exploration well drilled in the production licence area 477 in the Norwegian Sea.
Test drilling on the 6506/11-9 S Cooper well found oil but it could not be brought to the surface. The well will now be plugged and abandoned.
Graham Stewart, Chief Executive of Faroe Petroleum, said: "Although the drill stem test results on the Garn formation were disappointing, we take encouragement from the discoveries made at multiple horizons and that the poor flow characteristics of the Jurassic reservoir observed in this well are not seen in the other nearby producing fields.
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"We will continue to evaluate the large amount of data that has been collected in the Cooper well to try to resolve why the Garn formation is tight and whether this is likely to be a local or a field wide reservoir phenomenon. Our high impact drilling campaign continues with the North Uist well with BP as operator, West of Shetlands and we look forward to spudding the Spaniards well in the UK with Premier Oil as operator in October 2012."
The share price fell 8.01% to 146.50p by 13:38.
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