Statoil has agreed to reduce its working interest in the non-operated U.S. southern Marcellus onshore asset from 29% to 23%, following a $394 million transaction with Southwestern Energy, Statoil said in a news release.

The transaction covers 515,000 acres in the southern part of the Marcellus in which Statoil today holds an average working interest of 29%.

The divested share of the Southern Marcellus represents approximately 30,000 acres. Statoil’s 2014 third-quarter production from the Marcellus play amounted to 130,500 boe/d, of which about 4,000 bbl came from the assets included in the transaction, the release said.

Southwestern announced the acquisition of Chesapeake Energy’s holdings in the Southern Marcellus asset Oct. 16, 2014.

Statoil have agreed to give Chesapeake consent for their transaction with Southwestern. Statoil and Southwestern have now agreed to the partial sell-down of Statoil’s interest at an equivalent price to that agreed between Chesapeake and Southwestern, the release said.

The two companies have put in place a new joint development agreement. Following the transaction, Statoil will hold about 23% of the underlying non-operated Southern Marcellus assets. The transaction is expected to close in first-quarter 2015, Statoil said in the release.