The vessel “R.V Harrier Explorer” and the company PGS Exploration has just finished this year’s surveying of the Barents Sea floor. A total of 11,400 linear kilometres of two-dimensional seismic data has been collected, Upstream reports.
Norway started explorations the day after the Agreement on Delimitation of the Barents Sea came into force, BarentsObserver reported. The seismic surveys will be concluded next autumn, which means that the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate will have the results ready sometime in the winter 2013. The first drilling will not start until 2014.
Russia plans to start mapping the eastern side of the new maritime border in 2012, Said Anatoly Dmitriyevsky, Director of the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of the problems of oil and gas, Voice of Russia reports.
If the Russians start seismic surveys next summer, they could also have analyzed results ready by 2013. In all likelihood both countries could start simultaneous exploration of the area in 2014.
