Energy powerhouse Norway could soon be short of rigs, and oil companies face a fairly tight rig market when their medium-term exploration drilling gets underway, according to an article in the latest edition of Scandoil.com affiliate Scandinavian Oil-Gas Magazine.

“There will be an undersupply of rigs in Norway,” Ulrik Otto Engelschiøn of offshore analysts Platou told the Magazine. In recent years, the rise of "rig tightness" have kept rig rates high in the Scandinavian country.

Local energy champion StatoilHydro, Norway’s largest company and a deepwater powerhouse, reported only a fraction of its reserves were replaced in 2008, in contrast to its peers. Slumping oil production has brought a perceived need for more drilling, although gas production is up.

“If Norway is to keep up its production rate, there needs to be much more drilling,” Engelschiøn said.

The Scandinavian Oil-Gas article asserts that rig fortunes have not lived up to the general market gloom for 2009. Despite a few cancelled contracts and financing setbacks, hard-working chief financial officers and larger, deeper-pocketed rig-owning companies have kept growth alive.

And most are meeting their commitments to build new rigs.

“In most cases, there is an ability to pay for newbuilds,” said Engelschiøn.

Rig giants Transocean and Ensco were only recently booking day rates at near all-time highs.

While this week in rigs was shaken by Seadrill’s $790 million quarterly net loss, much of that was equity market loss. The company’s operating profit was up by a third in the quarter over the same span in 2007.

People have run from stocks, the article says, and low oil prices have combined with economic shakes to produce an irrational flight from rig stocks.