Statoil makes North Sea oil find

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STAVANGER, Norway, Aug. 27 (UPI) -- Norwegian energy company Statoil announced its latest discovery in the North Sea could hold as much as 270 million barrels of oil equivalent.

Statoil announced a drilling rig encountered a 114-foot oil column in the Geitungen prospect in what's known as the Johan Sverdrup discovery area. The company said it estimated the prospect holds 140 million-270 million barrels of recoverable oil equivalent.

"A new oil discovery in the Johan Sverdrup area, in the mature part of the North Sea reinforces Statoil's faith in the exploration potential of the Norwegian continental shelf, and demonstrates that we deliver on our strategy of revitalizing the NCS with high value barrels," Gro Haatvedt, senior vice president exploration Norway in Statoil, said in a statement.

Statoil last year announced one of the largest oil finds on the Norwegian continental shelf at the Sverdrup field. The company estimated there were 900 million-1.5 billion barrels of recoverable oil equivalent there, twice the previous estimate.

Statoil said it expected to maintain a production capacity from the NCS of around 600,000 barrels of oil per day for the rest of the decade.