Platts Considering 1st Addition to Brent Basket Since 2007

Oil pricing agency Platts is considering the first major overhaul in nearly a decade of its benchmark dated Brent assessment, which is used for most of the world’s crude trade. It may add Norwegian light sweet Troll crude to the basket of oil flows it uses to set the price of dated Brent, it said, Reuters reported. Adding another blend of crude should help liquidity as supply from traditionally larger, older North Sea fields that produce Brent, Forties, Oseberg and Ekofisk (BFOE), declines.

Troll is a light sweet crude and typically 10 to 15 cargoes of 600,000 barrels each are produced each month, compared with an average of about six or seven cargoes of the same size for Brent or Oseberg. Oil production in the North Sea was in decline for the best part of the last few years, raising questions about the validity of using dated Brent as a benchmark, which is backed by around 2 million barrels a day of supply, or roughly 2% of global output.

“Ultimately Brent is a benchmark that is an absolute beacon for the oil markets and the industry expects it to be here for not just two or 10 years, but 20 or 30 years,” S&P Global Platts global head of energy pricing David Ernsberger said.

Platts said it would invite comment until the end of January on adding Troll to the basket. The last addition Platts made was Ekofisk, a light, sweet crude produced jointly from British- and Norwegian-owned fields, in 2007.