There is “significant potential” for further discoveries in the Norwegian and Barents Seas, with 30pc of the world's undiscovered gas resources estimated to be in the Arctic, foreign minister Jonas Gahr Store said today. This raises the possibility of extending the Norwegian gas infrastructure from the North Sea to the Barents Sea, he said.

There must be sufficient quantities of gas for the 1,000km project to pay for itself, and an active exploration policy is needed for the Barents Sea.

State-owned gas system operator Gassco is examining the possibility of extending its pipelines north from the Nyhamna processing facility to Luva. But this would leave it well short of some of the recent Barents Sea finds near Snohvit. Gassco is due to report its findings this autumn.

The nuclear accident at Japan's Fukushima-Daiichi reactors after the March earthquake and tsunami — and the subsequent change in attitude towards nuclear power — had presented Norway with a window of opportunity, Store said. Norwegian gas can now play an even more important role in supplying Europe with energy, he said.

Norway exports 100bn m³/yr of gas through its pipelines to the EU. Increasing this would provide Norway with a large footprint in Europe for a non-EU member, he said.

A pipeline along the coast of northern Norway could provide an incentive for European industry to relocate production there, while Norway could process some gas locally, generating more jobs. The government will explore its options once Gassco has completed its study.

Gassco has said that any extension would involve upgrades and modifications to the Nyhamna processing facilities. It would also involve laying the deepest pipeline offshore Norway, at about 1,300m. It also warned that parts of the extended pipeline would likely need to be shut down after 2020 as production begins to decline.
 

Source: argusmedia.com