naturalfeature:arctic barents sea

Norway Arrests #Greenpeace Ship and 35 Activists During Protest at Arctic Oil Well – gCaptain
▻http://gcaptain.com/norway-arrests-greenpeace-ship-and-35-activists-during-protest-at-arctic-o

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Norwegian authorities have detained Greenpeace vessel Arctic Sunrise after a protest at a Statoil contracted drilling rig at Norway’s northernmost oil field in the Barents Sea, the environmental group said in a statement.

Greenpeace said the vessel and 35 activists were unlawfully detained after entering the exclusion zone of Statoil’s #Korpfjell well, halting drilling operations for the Songa Enabler semi-submersible. The ship, activists and crew members were all arrested by the Norwegian Coast Guard, the group said.

Greenpeace said it hopes the protest will send a message to the Norwegian government to stop oil drilling in the Arctic.

“Just 10 days before ratifying the Paris Agreement, in June 2016, the “environmentally friendly” Norwegian government granted new oil licenses. Now, a year later, Statoil has just started to drill for oil in the northernmost area ever licensed by Norway,” the group said.

In 2017, Statoil had scheduled to explore five licenses in the #Barents_Sea, including the northermost Korpfjell well. Exploration drilling will take place in the period from May to September using the Songa Enabler, a floating, self-propelled rig purpose-built for cold climates and operated by Songa Offshore.

Earlier this summer, the Arctic Sunrise met up with the Songa Enabler at a well about 170 miles north of the Norwegian coast, in the Arctic Barents sea.

Greenpeace activists protest near oil rig in Norway’s Arctic sea area
▻http://www.reuters.com/article/us-norway-oil-greenpeace-idUSKBN1A61SA

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Environmental activists protested on Friday near an offshore rig contracted by Statoil in the remote Norwegian Arctic, where the firm is looking for oil and gas deposits.

Norway’s Arctic Oil Ambitions Threatened by Slump in Oil - Businessweek

▻http://www.businessweek.com/news/2014-10-23/norway-s-arctic-oil-ambitions-threatened-by-slump-in-oil

Norway’s push to exploit Arctic waters for oil, already denounced by environmentalists, is now under threat from the slump in crude prices.

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The Arctic Barents Sea off northern Norway is reckoned to contain 40 percent of the country’s undiscovered resources and seen as key to extending oil output as aging North Sea fields decline. But operating there is expensive, and even before the recent plunge in prices, state-controlled Statoil ASA (STL)’s key project in the area had been delayed twice.

“The premises for what we’re discussing could be gone because of a weakening market,” Terje Aasland, a lawmaker from the opposition Labor Party, said during a debate on Arctic oil in Oslo yesterday. “What we believed a few months ago, we don’t believe today.”

#norvège #énergie #pétrole #barents

Norway agency wants to halt oil industry’s march north | Reuters

▻http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/28/norway-oil-arctic-idUSL5N0MP19220140328

(Reuters) - Norway should not award oil and gas exploration blocks further north in the Arctic Barents Sea and should withdraw more than a dozen blocks from the current licencing round, the Norwegian Environment Agency said on Friday.

The agency, which advises the government but cannot block its decisions, said more rigorous assessment of ice conditions was needed, including consideration of years when the polar ice cap might expand further.

“It is necessary to have a thorough scientific process to set a limit to the ice edge, which also covers the more extreme years,” Ellen Hambro, the agency’s director said in a statement. “The northernmost blocks nominated in the southern Barents Sea ... are located in areas where there may be ice.”

#arctique #énergie #norvège #gaz #pétrole