Statoil ASA (STO)

[Timothy Smith]

Statoil announced Thursday that it temporarily halted production this week at the Hammerfest LNG terminal in the Barents Sea.

The firm blamed the stoppage, which occurred on Tuesday, on water ingression in the plant's natural gas dryers. This can cause ice formation in the cooling circuit.

Statoil said it is making "big efforts" to get the gas liquefaction plant back on line quickly.

The LNG plant processes gas transported through an approximately 90-mies pipeline from subsea facilities on the Snøhvit and Albatross fields. Statoil's share of the Snøhvit output is around 50,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day.

In May, Statoil shut the Hammerfest plant down for scheduled maintenance. It was restarted at the beginning of June.