A delegation from Norway is in North Dakota this week to learn about the state's oil and gas economy.
So far, they have visited research and development facilities at NDSU in Fargo and UND in Grand Forks, and will next head to western North Dakota to begin touring the oil fields. Dr. Jostein (yo-stan) Mykletun is Consul General of Norway. He says Norway's largely off-shore oil industry took off in the last 40-50 years, so learning from North Dakota about on-shore wells makes sense. He says the United States is in the middle of an energy revolution, but the pace of that revolution is most visible and tangible in North Dakota.
"For many of us who have been to North Dakota before, we never dreamed this would happen. You know, we have a shared history of Norwegian homesteaders, and now we're back here, and it's modern times. So I think the underlying excitement in the visit is that we are both fairly young energy states, and there's a lot of learning to be done, exchanging of information, experience, and visions for the future - and ultimately, how can we collaborate more?"
The delegation signed an MOU, or "memorandum of understanding," at UND to continue fostering the relationship between North Dakota and Norway . Dr. Arne (ar-neh) Graue (grow-ee) is a professor at the University of Bergen and says it will strengthen ties between the universities and create more opportunities for students to study abroad. Graue says oil rich countries owe it to themselves to continue working on improving oil and gas technologies.
"Usually, when you produce oil and gas from unconventional resources, the production is declining from the early start on. And this is something we saw in unconventional gas production about 30 years back. The one thing that made a difference there was to do research and technological development in order to improve economical recovery by inventing new methods, more efficient methods to drain the oil and gas from the reservoirs."
The delegation will tour the oil fields for a couple of days this week and conclude their stay in by meeting with several state officials in Bismarck on Thursday.
