By Walter Gibbs and Wojciech Moskwa
OSLO (Reuters) - Norway's Oil and Energy Minister Terje Riis-Johansen will leave the government on Friday in a long-expected cabinet reshuffle, Norwegian media said citing unnamed government sources.
Public broadcaster NRK, the private TV2 station and the VG newspaper all said the minister would be replaced by Centre Party colleague Ola Borten Moe, a member of parliament since 2005 who is considered a favourite to become the party's deputy leader later this month.
Riis-Johansen declined to comment when interviewed outside his Oslo home by Norwegian media on Friday morning. Officials in his energy ministry and Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg's office also refused to comment.
The 42-year-old minister has been criticised for his handling of a costly and delayed carbon capture facility and a plan to build power cable across a scenic fjord.
He has also taken heat over revelations last autumn that his ministry awarded power-generation concessions to two publicly owned companies that made illegal donations to his agrarian-backed Centre Party.
Analysts have long said that Riis-Johansen's expected departure should not have much impact on energy policy in Norway -- the world's No. 5 exporter of oil and No. 2 of natural gas -- especially if he is replaced by a member of the same party.
Moe, 34, is a grandson of former Norwegian Prime Minister Per Borten.
The Labour-led coalition government is due to decide within months whether to do an impact assessment study on opening up the Lofoten region in the Arctic for exploration.
The Centre Party as well as the Socialist Left party have opposed the study, while Labour is expected to seek to push it through.
The oil industry has said that only by allowing drilling off the Lofotens, a region rich with fish, can Norway prolong its oil boom as output from North Sea oilfields dwindles.
(Editing by Jon Boyle)
