The unseasonably cold weather in southern areas and the Midlands will make way for a dry and sunny Bank Holiday weekend, forecasters said.

The prospect of a resurgence in Britain's long-declining North Sea oil industry received a boost today when the explorer Xcite Energy revealed that its giant Bentley oil field held 134 million barrels more than previously thought – worth about $14bn (£9bn) at current prices.

Fears of rising domestic energy prices eased slightly when prompt gas prices slid 15 per cent to a two-week low.

Britain's supplies are at the mercy of the weather and volatile markets unless it increases its meagre storage capacity, says Tom Bawden

Cairn Energy has signed a deal to acquire an interest in Senegal for the first time, as it continues to broaden its reach beyond Greenland, where expensive drilling has yet to yield results.

One of the experts behind the critically acclaimed documentary Frozen Planet, is in hot water in Norway over “disturbing” polar bears for another BBC show while filming them in the wild.

The Bank of England Governor has tentatively called the recovery, and UK Plc appears to be in agreement. Now, the Chancellor has to reinforce it

The UK's post-Olympic hangover is likely to be less painful than first feared this week, as the latest figures on the economy's performance at the end of 2012 gives some respite for the Chancellor.

Yesterday's keenly awaited GDP figures allowed the doom-mongers to forecast that the UK was headed for a "triple-dip" recession, if we were not in one already. The Chancellor, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, professed himself disappointed with the news, even as he vowed to press on with Plan A.

Drilling for North Sea oil and gas took off last year, as a resurgence in the UK continental shelf pushed up the number of new exploration and appraisal wells by a third.

North Sea employment is set to boom this year. Up to 50,000 new jobs are expected in Britain's oil and gas industry, according to analysis by a leading industry headhunter.

A £1 billion project to develop two oil fields in the North Sea has been given the go-ahead.

An independent Scotland could face deeper cuts to public spending than the rest of the UK, despite North Sea oil and gas revenues, the widely respected Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has concluded.

Shares in BG Group fell by 14 per cent to hit a two-year low yesterday after the gas producer that was spun out of British Gas admitted that its 2013 production forecasts were wrong and told the City not to expect any growth next year.