Oil production continued to decline in the older fields onshore in Europe, and large-scale production from North Sea fields still awaited completion of producing facilities. Gas production increased in The Netherlands and in the British North Sea, but was near its peak from present producing fields. There were 2 giant oil discoveries in Jurassic sandstones in the northern North Sea, Statfjord in the Norwegian area and Ninian in the United Kingdom sector. A series of still mostly unevaluated oil and gas condensate fields was found in the United Kingdom sector, including 4 oil discoveries in the Moray Firth basin east of Scotland. Oil and gas fields were found in the Norwegian and Dutch areas, and a gas discovery in German waters. There was active exploratory drilling on th Atlantic shelf west of the Shetland Islands, and oil shows were reported in one well. Oil was discovered for the first time in Greece, in the northern Aegean Sea. Two wells off the coast of southern Ireland flowed oil. In Italy the Melossa field, discovered in 1973 northeast of Milan, proved to have major gas and oil reserves. An oil discovery was made on the Adriatic coast of Italy. Wells on the Swedish Island of Gotland pumped small volumes of oil from the lower Paleozoic. Minor oil and gas discoveries were made in France, and there were 4 gas finds in Germany, one of them apparently important.

In the Soviet Union production of oil and condensate was 9,185,000 b/d and of gas 25.2 Bcf/d. Production from the West Siberian basin increased 40%, and most of this was from the Samotlor field. A new-pool discovery in the Jurassic of the Salym field of western Siberia proved giant-size oil reserves. Oil was found in the Paleozoic in 2 new West Siberian fields. Gas discoveries were made in central and northwestern Siberia, Middle Asia, and offshore in the eastern Caspian Sea, and new oil fields were found in the western Caspian.