Leading oil pricing agency S&P Global Platts said on February 20, 2017, it will add Norway's Troll crude to the existing basket that makes up the dated Brent benchmark from start of 2018.
Troll will join Brent, Forties, Oseberg and Ekofisk, or BFOE as they are known.
Dated Brent is at the core of the Brent crude complex and represents the most competitive grade of a basket of crudes loading in the North Sea on any given day.
The overhaul of the Brent oil assessment is being made to ensure there is sufficient supply underpinning the benchmark price for most of the world's oil.
«Dated Brent is a robust and well-supplied crude benchmark, but it is important to prepare for the future, in particular, the expected decline in North Sea production and the changing quality of the whole crude slate,» Jonty Rushforth, Director of S&P Global Platts said.
«Troll is the closest to the existing BFOE grades in characteristics and should provide an additional quarter of a million of barrels a day of deliverable crude.»
Troll is a light sweet crude oil grade with a typical production of 10-15 cargoes of 600,000 barrels each month.
The inclusion of Troll marks the 1st change to the dated Brent benchmark in over a decade.
The last crude grade to be added was Ekofisk, in 2007.
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