Mexico's Pemex is preparing this month to issue the first incentive-based contracts allowed under the country's 2008 oil reforms. Most observers agree that the reforms didn't go far enough, but will a new president in 2012 pick up the pace? Russell McCulley reports…
OE's analysis of current rig market data is updated monthly using statistics provided by Rigzone.com Worldwide utilization for the mobile offshore drilling fleet has averaged 74% over the last two months. Of late the global utilization rates…
Each time a hurricane sweeps through the Gulf of Mexico, operators hope for the best – that their infrastructure, from topsides to flowlines to wellheads, remains safe in the face of nature’s fury. Determined to protect its assets, Chevron sought…
A recent contract renewal for the small UK-based company WGP Group and its partner Thalassa Energy Services is a reminder that the first life of field seismic (LoFS) project on BP's Valhall field offshore Norway has been ongoing since 2003.…
HYWIND’S HIDDEN ASSETS: Syntactic foam specialist Trelleborg Offshore recently released details of how it employed well-proven offshore oil & gas technology in the subsea buoyancy arrangements for the world’s first wind turbine ‘floater’,…
Some new twists and turns have been added to the well chronicled travails of companies fighting an uphill battle to establish the use of marine controlled source electromagnetic (CSEM) technology for offshore hydrocarbon detection.Careful reading…
Prompted by practical engineering needs, Foster Wheeler Upstream developed a design tool to facilitate the design of subsea plate mudmats. Dr Jinming Xu, Paul Schank and Ray Young discuss how Mudmatician, through automation and built-in intelligence…
Global demand for floating hardware continues apace. David Morgan and Meg Chesshyre review recent support & supply sector initiatives and innovations targeting offshore platforms and rigs.Drilling riser departure A high pressure marine riser…
Worries about the future of natural gas dominated proceedings as the SPE’s Annual Technical Conference & Exhibition made its international debut in Florence last month. Speakers focused on what the industry must do to meet burgeoning global energy demand…
When setting out to reshape itself from a jack-of-all-trades drilling contractor to one with a deepwater future, Pride International realized it had to do more than simply change up its fleet. With deepwater assets tending to feature longer contract cycles than shallow and mid-water rigs…
Quicker connection Baker Hughes announced the commercialization of its Reconnect technology, which the company says provides an alternative for re-establishing surface hydraulic control to surface-controlled subsurface safety valves (SCSSVs)…
Not so long ago, in more favorable economic times, companies sought business school advice on leadership. Today, with their budgets shredded, companies are more likely to be seeking counsel on agility, says Southern Methodist University's Frank Lloyd…
BP put the final nail in the Macondo coffin 19 September with a successful relief well kill, ending a five-month ordeal that began with the deaths of 11 offshore workers and spilled some 5 million barrels of crude into the Gulf of Mexico.Now comes the task of repairing the company’s image…
Mexico just registered its first Clean Development Mechanism with the United Nations under a collaboration between Pemex and Statoil to reduce gas flaring at the onshore Tres Hermanos oil field in Mexico. Statoil said 26 October 2010 the registration…
Cairn Energy has wrapped up its 2010 exploration drilling campaign offshore Greenland and released both the Stena Forth and Stena Don rigs, the company said 26 October 2010.Cairn suspended the Alpha-1S1 exploration well to allow possible re-entry to sidetrack or deepen the well at a later date…