There was hardly a dry eye in the house on Thursday when Enterprise Oil announced success in its second test drilling in the Corrib field off the Mayo coast.

You could almost see the relief in the Bord Gais boardroom as it totted up how the discovery of a field on a par in size with Kinsale/Ballycotton, which has underpinned much of the State operator's success in recent years, would bolster it in the years ahead.

Apart from anything else, it would allow the company more time to consider how to finance a necessary second interconnector to Scotland to its best advantage.

The Minister for the Marine and Natural Resources, Michael Woods, was equally chirpy as he contemplated the increased interest in licences off the Irish coast, which such a successful find would spark, to say nothing of the savings to the Exchequer on the import of energy.

One group noticeable by the absence of comment was SIPTU, which has been at loggerheads with Enterprise for months over the use of non-domestic staff and resources to service the field.