Getting Developments Right?
December 10, 2014 - London UKFinding Petroleum
natalie@findingpetroleum.com
Phone:0208 123 2237
As illustrated in this report, our industry has profound problems getting development projects done at a reasonable cost, and then on time and on budget. And promised production levels sometimes do not appear. The problem seems to afflict everybody, whether Majors undertaking projects where they have worked before or, as the above report emphasises, 'minnows' swarming all over the Norwegian and UK sectors. The cause seems to be a cocktail of exaggerated executive expectations, inexperience operators and project staff, and exponentiating costs. A Major or a mini-Major can survive such ‘accidents’ – they may not enjoy them but they are robust. Smaller companies – E&Ps – are not; they are fragile, and will invariably see their share price hammered in the market place. Previously we have identified three root causes of the problem: 1. Under-appraisal of complex reservoirs. 2. Inadequate project design and concept selection. 3. Lack of QA of project execution. "What is to be done?" We invite insightfull contribtuions!