Norway launched a consultation on a 2021 licensing round in mature areas in which it offered 84 new blocks for oil and gas exploration, including 70 in the Arctic Barents Sea.
New blocks being offered are located southeast of Bear Island, roughly halfway between the Arctic Svalbard Archipelago and mainland Europe.
Four new blocks are offered in the North Sea and 10 in the Norwegian Sea, the Norwegian ministry added in a statement.
“Predictable access to [a] new exploration area is crucial for further development of the petroleum industry. It enables us to maintain activity and value creation on the Norwegian shelf and in the supplier industry,” Norway’s Oil and Energy Minister Tina Bru said in a statement.
Norway introduced these predefined areas (APA) licensing rounds in 2003 to facilitate exploration in the most geologically known parts of the Norwegian continental shelf. The government has increasingly used them to expand exploration acreage in the Barents Sea, which has only two producing fields.
Norway plans to announce the awards in January 2022.
The country also holds numbered licensing rounds focused on the frontier areas. The Ministry revealed that seven companies applied for production licenses in the most recent numbered licensing round, the 25th, on the Norwegian shelf. The 25th licensing round comprises nine areas outside the APA area on the Norwegian shelf. The round was announced on 19 November 2020 and includes one area in the Norwegian Sea and eight in the Barents Sea.
The companies that have applied for production licenses are A/S Norske Shell, Equinor Energy AS, Idemitsu Petroleum Norge AS, Ineos E&P Norge AS, Lundin Norway AS, OMV (Norge) AS, and Vår Energi AS.
The Ministry aims to award new production licenses in the 25th licensing round during the first part of this year.