Norway's Barents bounce
The death of Arctic exploration has been greatly exaggerated—in Norway, at least
The words frontier and Arctic have been anathema to most cost-conscious explorers since the oil price headed south, so Norway's efforts to bring the two together by trying to entice drillers to the Barents Sea carried some risks. That this effort has met with some success shows Norway is not your typical oil province—and a fresh discovery is likely to provide a springboard for further activity. Lundin Petroleum's Filicudi discovery in the western Barents Sea, announced in February, may not be the biggest, with a gross resource estimate of 35m-100m barrels of oil equivalent. But its location in the PL533 block is on trend with the Statoil-operated Johan Castberg discovery, just 40km north-wes
Also in this section
13 March 2026
Brussels is again weighing a cap on gas prices amid the Hormuz crisis, but the measure could backfire by deterring the LNG cargoes Europe urgently needs
12 March 2026
Emergency oil stocks provide a last line of defence to oil market shocks, so the IEA’s unprecedented 400m bl release represents something of a double-edged sword
12 March 2026
LPG could rapidly expand access to clean cooking across Africa and prevent hundreds of thousands of deaths from indoor air pollution each year, but infrastructure shortages and regulatory barriers are slowing investment and market growth
11 March 2026
Missiles over Dubai and disruption in Hormuz are testing the emirate’s reputation—and shaking the energy hub at the centre of the Gulf economy
