The 81 students who have participated in this year's summer project had their closing seminar and presentations in Stavanger on 5 August.
For eight weeks they have worked at Statoil's offices in Trondheim and Stavanger on 25 projects relevant for Statoil's commercial operation.
"The summer project is unique," says Arild Rødland, professor at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU). "I don't know of any other companies that have a similar scheme. The programme creates contact with students who could obviously be very useful to Statoil, and it could be utilised further."
He was a tutor for one of the teams and found that the way they worked made it easy to forget that they were students.
"That reflects the selection process - Statoil has obviously done its homework and is reaping the benefits," comments Mr Rødland.
Sveinung Helgetun, Brynjar Helgetun and Ola Solem worked on a project testing explosive welding to connect pipes. Their presentation was held in a tent outside Statoil's head office.
The summer project is an organised form of holiday job for young people from Norway and other countries who are pursuing university/college-level studies. It has been organised every summer for the past seven years, and each year has seen an increase in the number of applicants.
More mentors were used in 2004 than previously. Their job is to act as process drivers for activities.
"One of the mentors' roles is to spread information about the summer project to other organisational units," explains Ida Norheim Hagun, one of the students who participated in the project as a member of the mentor team. "The programme was set up by the Technology entity, but our goal has always been to involve as many units as possible."
The aim of the summer project is to improve collaboration between Statoil and higher education institutions, and to give the students experience of working on problem-solving in a large industrial group. At the same time, the summer project is important for the group with a view to future recruitment.