OSLO (Reuters) - The cost of developing Aker BP's (>> Aker BP ASA) Snadd gas discovery in the Norwegian Sea will probably amount to 10 billion crowns (£1 billion), a preliminary estimate by the company showed on Wednesday.

The discovery will be developed in two phases by using subsea templates tied back to the Skarv floating production, storage and offloading vessel (FPSO).

Current estimates are 6 billion crowns for the first phase, and 4 billion crowns for the second phase, a company spokesman said.

The costs will be finalised when Aker BP submits a plan for development and operations (PDO) later this year, with production expected to start in 2020, he added.

Snadd's ownership is identical to that of the Skarv field, in which operator Aker BP has a 23.84 percent stake, Statoil (>> Statoil ASA) holds 36.16 percent, DEA holds 28.08 percent and PGNiG (>> PGNiG SA) 11.92 percent.

The top owners of Aker BP are Aker ASA (>> Aker ASA) and BP Plc (>> BP plc).

(Reporting by Nerijus Adomaitis, editing by Terje Solsvik)

Stocks treated in this article : Aker ASA, Aker BP ASA, Statoil ASA, PGNiG SA, BP plc