Winter weather hits Europa oil production

20th Apr 2011 13:38

Shares in Europa Oil & Gas fell back after it announced that harsh winter weather conditions hurt UK production in the six months to 31 January.Output was down by about 12% on the same period last year, Europa said. "The exceptionally cold winter weather shut down our UK facilities for two weeks," the company said. Average daily production totalled 151 barrels of oil a day. Europa said its target of 500 barrels a day is unlikely to be met by the year end.It also said it is well placed to respond to the new taxes being imposed on the North Sea oil industry, which it says shift the balance towards exploration from existing field development."The 2012 UK programme will be geared more to exploration than development," the company said.In Romania, Europa said it hopes to deepen its Barchiz-1 well as soon as is practicable and that plans to appraise the Voitinel gas discovery have progressed. In France recent processing of data has confirmed that the Berenx prospect is "a very important asset for future value growth."---RG