UPDATE 2-Norway's oil output at 11-year low, 2.29 mln bpd
Tue Jul 19, 2005 6:55 AM ET
By Alister Doyle
OSLO, July 19 (Reuters) - Norway's monthly oil production
fell to an 11-year low of 2.29 million barrels per day (bpd) in
June, hit by halts of many offshore fields for maintenance, the
Norwegian Petroleum Directorate (NPD) said on Tuesday.
Production was down from 2.65 million bpd in May and 2.88
million in June 2004.
"A preliminary overview shows this is the lowest monthly
production since August 1994, when output was two million
barrels a day," Rune Hult, an official at the state-run NPD,
told Reuters.
Norway, usually the world's third largest exporter behind
Saudi Arabia and Russia, expects oil production to average
almost three million bpd in 2005. Norway's output has risen most
years since production started in 1971.
Hult said an unusual number of offshore installations were
shut for maintenance in June. Fields including Brage, Grane,
Heidrun, Kvitebjorn, Oseberg South and Statfjord B were
affected.
Operators take advantage of the Nordic summers to carry out
maintenance.
The NPD also said production of natural gas liquids and
condensate fell to 289,000 bpd in June from 385,000 bpd in May,
according to the preliminary figures.
It said that overall production in May totalled 22.1 million
standard cubic metres of oil equivalents, of which 13.1 million
were oil, 7.2 million natural gas, 1.2 million natural gas
liquids and 0.7 million condensate.
The total was 0.1 million standard cubic metres of oil
equivalents less than in May 2004.
OUTPUT DOWN
And production in January-May 2005 totalled 111.5 million
standard cubic metres of oil equivalents, 3.9 million less than
in the same five months of 2004.
"The decline is due to production halts and to technical
problems on a number of fields," the NPD said in a statement of
the five-month total.
A Norwegian revised budget in May predicted total oil and
gas output for 2005 at 264 million standard cubic metres, level
with 2004 and down from a forecast in October of 271 million.
One reason for the budget's downwards revision was the
closure of the 205,000 bpd Snorre and linked Vigdis oilfields on
Nov. 28 last year after a gas leak on Snorre. Snorre restarted
gradually in late January.
The Norwegian government reckons that oil output will be
roughly stable until 2007, when it will start to tail off. Total
oil and gas output is set to peak in 2008, held up by rising gas
production.
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