Norwegian oil company StatoilHydro ASA (STO, STL.OS) plans to sell a 40% stake in its Peregrino field offshore Brazil, the O Globo newspaper reported Wednesday.

StatoilHydro currently holds 100% of the field, located in the BM-C-7 block in the Campos Basin. The concession originally belonged to Anadarko Petroleum Corp. (APC) and EnCana Corp. (ECA), but StatoilHydro bought out both companies in separate transactions.

The O Globo report did not cite any source for the information. Any stake sale, however, would require approval of the National Petroleum Agency, or ANP.

When contacted by Dow Jones Newswires, StatoilHydro spokeswoman Mari Dotterud said that "we never comment on rumors. But as a general comment, within the oil and gas industry, keeping 100% ownership over the total lifetime of an asset would be unusual."

Peregrino is estimated to hold recoverable reserves of about 500 million barrels of heavy oil, rated at between 14 degrees and 16 degrees on the American Petroleum Institute's rating scale.

StatoilHydro plans to drill about 37 production wells at the field, with drilling expected to start in the first half of 2010. First oil is expected in 2011, with output expected to reach 100,000 barrels a day.

Production at Peregrino is expected to be via three floating production, storage and offloading vessels, or FPSOs.

StatoilHydrol holds stakes in 11 exploration and production blocks in Brazil. Company officials have said StatoilHydro plans to invest between $5 billion and $10 billion over the next 10 years to develop its Brazilian portfolio.

-By Jeff Fick and Elizabeth Adams, Dow Jones Newswires; 55-21-2586-6085; jeff.fick@dowjones.com