NEWS

Statoil said on Aug. 8 it had struck oil in the Aldous Major South prospect
in the North Sea and estimated its size at between 200 million and 400 million
barrels of oil equivalent (boe) and that it may be connected to the Avaldsnes
discovery made by Sweden’s Lundin Petroleum .

On Tuesday, Statoil confirmed the two prospects were connected and estimated
the size of the discoveries together at between 500 million and 1.2 billion
barrels of recoverable oil equivalent (boe).

“This is probably the biggest oil find (worldwide) in 2011,” Tim Dodson,
Statoil’s head of exploration, told reporters.

In June ExxonMobil said it had made three finds in the Gulf of Mexico totalling 700 million
boe, while in April Statoil made a find in the Barents Sea estimated to hold at
least 150-250 million, with considerable upside.

The latest find will help Statoil achieve its goal of hiking its annual
production by a third by 2020 to 2.5 million boed, Dodson said, but would not
change its production estimates for the next few years.

Statoil has struggled with declining oil production in recent years and has
often revised downwards its future production estimates. Last year it produced
1.89 million boed, down from 1.96 million boed in 2009.

“Aldous/Avaldsnes … may make the top 10 list of NCS (Norwegian continental
shelf) oil discoveries,” Dodson said in a statement. “Norway has not seen a
similar oil discovery since the mid-eighties.”

Norway’s two biggest ever oil discoveries were Ekofisk and Statfjord, with
more than 3 billion boe each, which were both made in the 1970s and are still in
production.

Statoil said there were strong indications that Aldous Major South was twice
as big as the numbers announced last week, with estimates standing now to a
potential 400 to 800 million boe.

There could be more potential in the area, Statoil said, with a nearby
prospect, Aldous Major North, expected to hold some 100 to 300 million boe. The
firm said it would have more results from that licence within a month.

Avaldsnes is estimated to hold between 100 and 400 million boe, Lundin
previously said.

Shares in Statoil were up 0.33 percent at 0957 GMT, outperforming an Oslo
benchmark index down 1.25 percent, while Det norske’s were up 26.5 percent.

Lundin shares were up 6.9 percent while the Stockholm benchmark index was
down 2 percent.