Newly published Polar class vessel rules from French classification society Bureau Veritas are aimed at speeding Arctic and Caspian Sea oil and gas development by facilitating the building of tank, cargo and offshore service vessels which can operate unsupported by icebreakers in very heavy ice…
No crystal ball is needed to determine one area of offshore activity where spending will rise inexorably in coming years: inspection, repair and maintenance. With one leading commentator predicting this sector’s annual spend will reach $7 billion by 2014…
Russell McCulley reviews recent developments and talking points in the offshore communications arena.Florida-based Harris Corporation followed its summer 2010, $525 million acquisition of CapRock Communications with the purchase of Schlumberger's Global Connectivity Services (GCS) in November…
Industry experts gathered in Houston late last year to discuss the future of floating LNG. Jennifer Pallanich joined them.A supply glut stemming from a wave of project sanctions between 2003 and 2005 followed by the North American shale revolution…
With close proximity to the offshore Cantarell and Ku-Maloob-Zaap fields, the inland Gulf of Mexico port of Villahermosa is a major operation center for Mexican state oil company Pemex. Last month the city again played host to the Petroleum Exhibition & Conference of Mexico (PECOM)…
Worldwide utilization for the mobile offshore drilling fleet averaged 72% over the last month. Of late the global utilization rates for semisubmersibles have held steady at approximately 83% while rates for drillships have bounced around the mid-to-low 80% range…
McDermott picked up a Bentley Systems innovation in construction award at the infrastructure software provider’s recent ‘Be Inspired’ gathering in Amsterdam for the early delivery of the Su Tu Vang central processing platform at the Cuu Long project offshore Vietnam…
Things are stirring on the UK continental shelf if the attendance at last month’s Pilot Share Fair in Aberdeen is anything to go by. More than 1000 people, including Meg Chesshyre, turned out to hear from major operators and contractors about their strategies for future North Sea projects…
It’s amazing how little it takes for perspective on a business to change more or less overnight and be seen through a completely fresh set of lenses. Andrew McBarnet reviews some surprising developments.A month or so ago at the annual meeting…
The days may be numbered for resource nationalism, Robert Johnson told the Houston World Affairs Council at the Mayer Brown offices late October. ‘Not every country is equally capable of exercising a campaign of resource nationalism,’ said Johnson…
Post-Macondo efforts to improve well containment capabilities on both sides of the Atlantic moved into higher gear last month.In the US it was confirmed that Technip will handle front- end engineering and design of a proposed subsea well containment…
With a Norwegian sector breakthrough in the area of subsea gas compression very much on the cards for the next year or two, Statoil last month reaffirmed the case for compression in the Åsgard area while one the key vendors targeting this technology…
Water jetting is now a well-established subsea approach and the technology has evolved significantly in the 30 years since the first mass-flow excavation (MFE) tool reached the market. David Morgan looks at the latest such development: the Marin Group Evo Claycutting system…
A configuration change-up on traditional spars could spell out some relief in wind load, drop the unit’s center of gravity, slim down the hull, and cut the amount of tripping time needed for drilling operations from a spar. OE’s Jennifer Pallanich…
Offshore topsides must be light enough to be economical, yet big and robust to contain all the drilling and production equipment needed to develop the field. Alliance Engineering’s Norb Roobaert argues that there is no need to compromise safety…
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