‘Securing Safe, Smart, Sustainable Supply' is the highly alliterative theme for this year's Offshore Europe conference, to be held in Aberdeen 6-8 September. It will be chaired by Amec chief executive Samir Brikho.
It is not just about having energy, it is about security of energy, it is the sustainability of energy and affordability of energy, according to Amec CEO Samir Brikho: ‘We need to get a much better alignment and collaboration between the operators, the service providers, the governments and the consumers. We see this conference as very important because this is going to be the platform where we take time and discuss issues very thoroughly in order to determine the path forward.'
What is the role of the operator, the regulator, the supplier? Learning from the Gulf of Mexico incident, there was a chance to make matters more transparent, he believes.
There will be panel discussions about the different operating models, the impact of CO2 and the actions being taken, deepwater activities, safety processes, new technologies. On the carbon capture front there were a lot of technologies out there, but everyone would like to have a clarification as to what making an investment meant in order to ensure IRR, or internal rate of return.
As technologies evolved so did the demands on the supply chain for the qualification of people, says Brikho. A company like Amec, he adds, has been investing tens of millions in developing its people for the demands of an ever-changing future. Renewable energy was growing fast, but where were the biofuel and solar engineers? New skills were needed for deepwater and for nuclear activities. Only 30 years ago deepwater activity meant maybe 100m water depth, now it is 3km.
Operating models are changing dramatically, particularly in the North Sea. An independent like Fairfield is maybe producing tens of thousands of barrels with some 12 or 13 employees. They had changed the business model, using a duty holder, in this case Amec. Other companies included Wood Group, WorleyParsons and Petrofac. The changing roles meant decisions were needed as to who would take on the risks.
Dialogue with government is important. Brikho had been invited to ‘No 10' (the UK prime minister's office in London's Downing Street) in January to discuss growth strategy in the UK and how more jobs could be created going forward. ‘I think we are coming to a discussion with the government about whether we are able to tweak the taxes in order to make the North Sea a more favourable place for investment and a continued revenue stream to the government, and also for redeployment,' he says.
Today the North Sea employs around 440,000 people. This could potentially be increased by at least 15-20,000. Chancellor George Osborne was said to be ‘listening to and understanding' what the UK offshore sector had to say about the tax regime.
Brikho says the question is how are we going forward? ‘We all know that any installation we have today may have a lifetime of more than 30 or 40 years. If we look at the power generation we have today, the decision was taken many years ago. It is crucial to think very hard and smart over how and what we are going to install now, or decide now, in order that the next generation can actually live on it.'
He stresses the importance of carbon reduction. Replacing a coal-fired power plant with a gas fired power plant would cut emissions by more than 70%. One of the Offshore Europe 2011 panel topics will be what upstream operators are going to do in order to reduce their carbon footprint. Carbon capture would also be discussed.
Brikho notes the rapid growth of the renewable sector, which is expected to reach 4.1% of the world installed energy base by 2030, with solar accounting for about 1%. This does not sound much, but the starting point had been zero. In percentage terms in the US, solar business has recently been growing by 60% year on year, whereas 1-3% in the oil and gas business would have been viewed as a boom year. Just 1% solar energy in the US in 2030 would mean 8GW (8000MW). 1MW of conventional panels currently needs 240 acres of land. Meanwhile, the base is still going to be fossil fuel up to 2030 and maybe beyond, he says.
Recent natural disasters have made people increasingly concerned about climate change, noted Brikho. A number of issues needed to be resolved.
The question is how much time do we have? ‘So when are we going to discuss it? I feel it has been postponed and postponed and postponed. I feel that 2011 could actually be a year for the energy sector to determine what the journey should look like,' he says.
Samir Brikho
Since taking over as Amec CEO in October 2006, Samir Brikho (pictured) has led the company's transformation into a leading supplier of consultancy, engineering and project management services to the natural resources, nuclear, clean energy, water and environmental sectors.
He previously served as a member of the group executive committee of Switzerland's ABB, head of its Power Systems Division and chairman of ABB Lummus Global.
In addition to chairing Offshore Europe 2011, Brikho is a director of the UK-Japan 21st Century Group and in February 2010 was appointed a UK business ambassador.
Fluent in Swedish, Arabic, English, German and French, Brikho holds an engineering degree, Master of Science in Thermal Technology from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden, and completed the YMP Programme at Insead in France in 1991. He completed a Stanford senior executive programme in the US in 2000. OE