The foundations of the global energy system are shifting and the lives of energy policy makers are not getting any easier. If they didn’t have enough to worry about with securing affordable, sustainable supplies of energy to meet national needs…
The Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) Aberdeen Section has announced two new categories for this year’s Offshore Achievement Awards, which launch on October 1. The awards, supported by TAQA, have a 27-year history of celebrating outstanding…
Centrica Energy has paid tribute to the life of one of its pioneering exploration engineers who first discovered gas in Morecambe Bay Retired Chief Petrophysicist John Bains has died following a distinguished career which saw him discover one of the UK’s largest gas fields…
OMV is to invest in an offshore exploration block west of Madagascar. OMV will acquire a 40% stake in the Grand Prix block from Niko Resources (Niko). OMV will farm-in to the area for the planned drilling of an exploration well. OMV will…
Petroceltic International has launched drilling campaigns offshore Romania and in Kurdistan. The Romanian campaign, in the Black Sea, started with the spudding of the Cobalcescu South exploration well using the GSP Prometeu jack-up drill rig…
Viper Subsea will unveil its latest innovation on its stand (6A20) at SPE Offshore Europe 2013. The V-LIFE provides a solution to one of subsea engineering’s most common problems – the degradation of insulation resistance in subsea cables and umbilicals…
New vessels, acquisitions, and expertise are driving Dutch growth. Elaine Maslin reports. The Dutch offshore sector is leveraging its engineering and seafaring traditions to grow its presence in the global oil and gas industry. The…
The Danish offshore is a mature oil and gas province with 40 years of production, but the Danish Energy Agency’s latest annual report,* says that the country is expected to remain a net exporter of oil through 2020, while gas production is…
A new offshore safety directive, issued by the European Union, has been adopted across the continent. Remi Eriksen, CEO DNV Maritime Oil & Gas, and Graham Bennett, VP DNV, business development director, division Europe and North Africa, take a look at the consequences…
Suction piles have anchored offshore oil and gas production for years, but a new type - called a bucket foundation - is being promoted for offshore wind turbines in an effort to reduce costs. In February, Forewind, a consortium planning a huge turbine farm in the North Sea…
Subsea UK is calling on the UK government to back plans for a national program that will support and fund subsea research, and a UK-wide skills program that will help the sector find the 10,000 people it needs to capitalize on current and future demand…
Nexans has fine tuned its specialized facility at Halden in Norway, after a cable failed to meet the final acceptance test a couple of years ago and had to be remade. Meg Chesshyre visited the plant, which has a full order book and a more than two-year backlog…
Scandinavia’s oil and gas industry, focused on Norway and Denmark, is expecting a resurgence. Espen Erlingsen looks at trends in the sector. The North Sea is characterized by large, producing platforms with declining production. To stop the falling production in the North Sea…
Twenty years after it came online, the UK’s longest serving permanently-moored FPSO has been given a new lease on life. Elaine Maslin reports on the extent the UK’s largest offshore project in 2012. When production from the central North Sea Gryphon field came online in October 1993…
Norway’s offshore region covers 2.04 million sq km and is split into five areas: the northern, southern and central parts of the North Sea, the Norwegian Sea and the Barents Sea. Over the five regions, there have been 1400 exploration wells drilled since 1966…