https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/01/16/uk-energy-insecurity-norwegian-gas-reserves-decline/
This came up on the news section of my phone, less worried about the Britain part, but from my knowledge, the oil and gas sector makes up an awfully big chunk of the Norwegian economy.
My question is kind of rhetorical, obviously once it depletes it is gone and no more money comes in, but do any Norwegians know if Norway has this in mind, or if the government have spoken about this?
I'm taking the graph with a grain of salt but from the graph it isn't really that long until it is "depleted". Are there any ways in which Norway is actively trying to diversify its economy? Because I think this could be detrimental.
by LimeTraveleer
7 comments
The knowledge that these resources will eventually run out, was one of the reasons why the so-called “Oil Fund” (formally “Government Pension Fund Global”) was created: [https://www.nbim.no/en/](https://www.nbim.no/en/) The idea being to put the majority of the proceeds into a fund that will still provide a surplus when the resources are gone.
I think this is based on if Norway don’t keep investing in oil and gas. There’s still huge fields that we haven’t tapped into yet, but if the government choose to cut back on oil- and gasproduction this could be a likely scenario.
We will just move onto our next resource? [https://www.euronews.com/green/2023/07/10/huge-mineral-discovery-in-norway-could-supply-battery-and-solar-panels-for-the-next-100-ye](https://www.euronews.com/green/2023/07/10/huge-mineral-discovery-in-norway-could-supply-battery-and-solar-panels-for-the-next-100-ye)
Battery research and factories and quite big as well here
Our economy is more than just oil and gas, but it is an uncomfortably large part of the economy, and it is going to be difficult to replace it. I do not think that Norway will become poor due to the eventual decline of the oil and gas industry, but I foresee that Norway will grow slower or even stagnate compared to other Scandinavian countries.
We also have a large public sector, including me by the way. I worry that if the public sector becomes too large it will hamper wage growth within the public sector. While also hampering the growth of private sector companies that need employees, and lead to too much taxes that will give Norwegian business a competitive disadvantage. I am in favor of redistribution, but worry that wealth taxes impact the development of companies negatively. As owners may want to dividends to pay taxes rather than reinvest, and other companies may rise in value despite not being profitable yet. Wanting more money now could lead to less money in the future.
Yes – by becoming stock owners instead.
With small adjustments Norway could easily go for 0 taxes and beat Ireland at their own game. So that’s one solution.
Another is phosphate mining.
A third is underwater mineral mining (more speculative).
A forth is just to search for more oil and gas.
Pretty much whatever we fancy.
They are already planning for this, investing in other resource extraction, green energy (offshore wind, hydrogen, etc), and other industries.
There are more reserves, but one of the reasons for the drop is that new fields are not being developed. There were licences approved for artic development, but the projects have not been permitted to go ahead. I guess that could change if the government swings right again.
But we need to plan for a world without oil & gas. Even if there are new fields developed, it’s not good for the environment, and they will also run out.
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