FAROE Petroleum has added more exploration acreage in Norway under an expansion drive that it has maintained off the country amid the crude price plunge although it has not acquired any more UK licences since late 2014.

However the Aberdeen-based company said it will continue the hunt for oil and gas in the UK North Sea.

Aim-listed Faroe won four licences off Norway in the latest round, continuing a record of successful bidding that goes back to 2010.

Faroe has been awarded a total of 15 licences off Norway in three rounds completed since the oil price started tumbling in the summer of 2014.

The only UK exploration licence Faroe holds in the UK, covering the Fynn prospect off north east Scotland, was awarded in November 2014. The company won it under a licensing round launched during the boom in the industry, which ended when growth in supplies ran well ahead of demand.

Faroe’s decision to focus its hunt for new finds on Norway in tough times for the industry is likely to stoke concern about the state of the exploration effort in the UK.

Drilling activity has held up fairly well in Norway, with 36 wells started last year, partly thanks to the country’s policy of refunding 78 per cent of the costs concerned each year.

When combined with the drop in the cost of services triggered by the oil price fall, the subsidies mean companies can drill wells at relatively low cost.

Exploration drilling fell to a 40 year low of 15 wells in the UK last year. Companies focused resources on maintaining cash-generating production as they grappled with the deep downturn in the industry.

The fall in activity has led to concerns billions of barrels oil and gas could be left undeveloped.

With some big new fields due to come onstream off Shetland this year, the hard pressed oil services industry needs firms to make new finds to help provide work.

A spokesperson for Faroe Petroleum said: “We are Aberdeen headquartered and see the UK as a core part of our balanced portfolio of exploration, appraisal and production.”

He added: “As the cycle in the oil industry turns we will continue to look to add assets both in the UK and in Norway. We have become bigger in Norway than in the UK, one of our goals is to have a material core position also in the UK with both production and exploration activity.”

On Tuesday consultancy Wood Mackenzie noted signs of increased exploration interest in frontier areas such as West of Shetland, following the partial recovery in the oil price in recent months.

However, it expects only 15 wells will be drilled in UK waters this year.