As Australia grapples with chronic oil production decline in the face of rising imports, the buoyant gas sector offers the prospect of rising revenue from LNG export. John Mueller reports.Eyebrow Natural gas lifts Australian reserves As Australia…
BP is celebrating production from the Skarv field in the Norwegian Sea. CEO Bob Dudley called the start-up a “key operational milestone” for the supermajor. The Skarv development includes an FPSO (pictured), five subsea drilling templates, and a 26in diameter…
As oil and natural gas production continues to fluctuate at a level well below demand, John Mueller looks at New Zealand’s growing need to aggressively explore the nation’s vast and extensive offshore sedimentary basins.Taranaki Basin, located along the west coast of New Zealand’s North Island…
Although Papua New Guinea has a strong economy resulting from exploitation of its extensive petroleum deposits and abundance of other natural resources ranging from minerals to forest products, the nation is one of the least developed countries in the Asia Pacific region…
As the oil & gas industry ventures into deeper waters and more extreme environments, operators, umbilical equipment designers and manufacturers, and installation companies, have been working together to ensure umbilical installation is as smooth an operation as possible…
BP starts production at Valhall redevelopment Valhall field (Photo: BP)Production has begun at BP's Valhall redevelopment project in the southern portion of the Norwegian North Sea, the supermajor announced on 28 January 2013. BP Group…
Egypt approves Dana's Nefertiti development The Egyptian government has approved Dana Petroleum's plan to develop the Nefertiti oil field in the Gulf of Suez, the company announced on 29 January 2013.The lease was approved 20 January…
Licensing round awards three deepwater blocksClick to view larger mapA consortium made up of Eni and Kogas has won three deepwater blocks during the Republic of Cyprus' second offshore licensing round, Eni announced on 24 January 2013.The consortium walked away with Blocks 2…
Chevron signs up for South China Sea acreageChevron China and China National Offshore Oil Corp. (CNOOC) have entered into production sharing contracts (PSC) for two exploration blocks in the South China Sea, the company announced on 16 January 2013…
Statoil receives 14 licenses during APA roundMinister of Petroleum and Energy Ola Borten Moe (Photo: Lise Rist / OED)Forty companies walked away with shares in 51 new production licenses as part of Norway’s 2012 APA Round, the country’s…
Salamander Energy announced first oil at its Bualuang Bravo platform in the Gulf of Thailand. The Atwood Mako drilled development well BB-04-H, which is expected to produce 1500b/d. With a 15-well development planned, Salamander expects production to increase to around 14,000b/d in 2013.
During the past few years, annual change in global oil demand has been running 0.8-1%/year and the International Energy Agency (IEA) forecasts it to continue in that range in 2013 – well below the previous 20-year 1.5% average annual increase seen before the global banking crisis…
Andrew McBarnetIf there was such a thing as an annual horoscope for the marine seismic and related geophysical businesses, then in the coming year we can expect at least some improvement on 2012. In other words, unless there is some totally unexpected destabilizing economic…
Sapinhoá field begins production off BrazilSapinhoá mapCommercial production has begun at Sapinhoá field, Repsol announced on 8 January 2013.The field, run by a consortium of Repsol, Petrobras and BG Group, is located in Block BM-S-9 in Brazil’s pre-salt region…
Understanding the environmental conditions at a site are important to determine when offloading operations need to be suspended or when an offloading tanker needs to be disconnected. BMT Argoss naval architect Wojciech Misiag explains why optimising…