Norway's oil and gas output should remain at current levels for the next decade, the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate said Wednesday, although a senior official said he expected output to rise after some recent major discoveries.
Norwegian Petroleum Directorate senior adviser and former Deputy Director General Kjell Dragvik told Platts by telephone from Stavanger that the NPD was predicting that in 2015 crude production would be down to 1.5
million b/d -- but that gas output would be up at 112.2 billion cubic meters. Gas production in the current year is seen at 106.4 Bcm.
But he added that huge finds announced this year had not been included in the report because it was still too early for complete data. When they were, it was possible the numbers would have to be revised upwards.
"My view is that there could be a revision upwards. I would not exclude the possibility," Dragvik said.
These include the massive Avaldsnes/Aldous discovery whose combined oil structure is estimated to hold gross contingent resources of 1.2 billion to 2.6 billion barrels of recoverable oil equivalents, according to one partner, Sweden's Lundin Petroleum.
An NPD official said Wednesday it would wait until next year before including the recent oil discoveries with the overall resource estimates.
Norway, the world's eighth biggest crude exporter and second biggest gas exporter, has seen its oil output declining steadily from the 2001 peak at 3.42 million b/d. It produced 1.8 million b/d last year.
The NPD, issuing its 2011 resource estimate, said the overall maintenance of output was despite a gradual decline in production from the major fields.
"Measures to increase recovery and starting up production from discoveries will contribute to maintaining production," the NPD said in a statement.
"After 2020, production from undiscovered resources will account for an increasing share of the expected production," it added.
It said that uncertainty attached to the forecast for the next few years was largely linked to production of the reserves.
There is also uncertainty over when discoveries would be developed and put into production, and how much they would produce.
In January, the NPD said Norwegian crude production was expected in 2011 to drop to 1.7 million barrels a day from 2010's 1.8 million b/d.
Statistician Tom Andersen said Wednesday that that prediction had not changed.
The NPD said its preliminary total for September crude output was 1.557 million b/d, down 1.8% from 1.585 million b/d a year earlier.
The country's gas production in September was 7.4 billion cubic meters - up 29.8% from the 5.7 billion cu m in September 2010.
