Shell to hand operatorship of Nyhamna plant to Gassco in 2017

Reuters - UK Focus

STAVANGER, Norway, Nov 16 (Reuters) - Royal Dutch Shell (LSE: 0LN9.L - news) Norway upstream vice president Rich Denny told Reuters on Wednesday:

** Shell (LSE: RDSB.L - news) plans to start testing new booster compressors at its Nyhamna gas processing plant in Norway next year

** "I can't give you the exact date but the project is on track for starting up in 2017... It's somewhere near the middle of the year."

** Says Shell plans to hand operatorship of Nyhamna plant to Norway's offshore gas system operator Gassco around the middle of 2017

** Says operatorship handover will not affect ownership structure of Shell-operated Ormen Lange field, but can impact ownership of the Nyhamna plant

** "The infrastructure will become part of a new joint venture and the ownership in that is still to be decided. That's for the (Oil and Energy) ministry to decide."

** Shell's partners in Ormen Lange field and Nyhamna plant include Statoil (LSE: 0M2Z.L - news) , ExxonMobil, DONG Energy (LSE: 0RHE.L - news) and Norway's state-owned Petoro

** Nyhamna is expected to start processing gas from Statoil-operated Aasta Hansteen field in 2018 (Reporting by Stine Jacobsen, editing by Nerijus Adomaitis)