US oil and gas drilling activity this week increase by 20 units to reach 1,965 total rigs working. The rig count for the week ended May 4 was up by 129 rigs compared with the same period a year ago, Baker Hughes Inc. reported.

Lundin Norway AS has signed a letter of intent with Kvaerner Stord AS serving as an engineering, procurement, and construction contract covering topside installations for a steel platform on Edvard Grieg oil and gas field, previously called Luno, offshore Norway.

The Leviathan-1 well has become the Levant basin’s deepest known penetration at a total depth of 21,400 ft, where Noble Energy Inc. halted drilling due to high pressure and mechanical limits of the wellbore design.

US oil and gas drilling activity this week declined by 27 units to reach 1,945 total rigs working. The rig count for the week ended Apr. 27 was up by 127 rigs compared with the same period a year ago, Baker Hughes Inc. reported.

Lukoil has started drilling production wells and building the central processing facility at supergiant West Qurna-2 oil field in Iraq, where it targets production of 500,000 b/d by 2013-14 (OGJ Online, Mar. 22, 2012).

Exploratory well completions increased by 12% in this year’s first quarter, the American Petroleum Institute said in its latest quarterly well completion report.

US oil and gas drilling activity this week increased by 22 units to reach 1,972 total rigs working. The rig count for the week ended Apr. 20 was up by 172 rigs from the comparable period a year ago, Baker Hughes Inc. reported.

Statoil let a contract to Aker Solutions to hire a category B drilling rig, a new type of rig, which is designed to increase recovery from the company’s operating fields on the Norwegian continental shelf (NCS).

Hydraulic fracturing in the UK has received guarded approval in a government review of a study about seismic events last year around a Cuadrilla Resources Ltd. shale-gas well near Poulton-le-Fylde (OGJ Online, Nov. 3, 2011).

US oil and gas drilling activity this week decreased by 29 units to reach 1,950 total rigs working. The rig count for the week ended Apr. 13 was up by 178 rigs from the comparable period a year ago, Baker Hughes Inc. reported.

US oil and gas drilling activity this week remained unchanged at 1,979 total rigs working. The rig count for the week ended Apr. 6 was up by 197 rigs from the comparable period a year ago, Baker Hughes Inc. reported.

BP PLC signed a contract for Ensco PLC’s DS-6 ultradeepwater drillship for 5 years at $522,000/day, plus cost adjustments.

Niko Resources Ltd., Calgary, is starting a multibasin exploratory drilling campaign in Indonesia as the company gained participation in its 21^st block in Indonesia.