HighlightsInternational Association of Oil & Gas Producers

New committee aims to improve oil & gas industry’s influence

The Chair of the Communications Committee, Andrew Hogg, is clear

on how better communications can help OGP. ‘Increasingly,’ he says, ‘OGP is being asked to act as an advocacy organisation and represent the industry at an international level. This makes it necessary to take the good work being done by committees and explain it in a way that engages stakeholders.

‘Improving our communication efforts with our main external stakeholders, which include international regulators, industry bodies, special councils, National Oil Industry Association (NOIAs) and specialist media, will help OGP increase its reputation as an internationally recognised representative body of the oil & gas industry.’In recognition of OGP’s emerging advocacy role, the Communications Task Force was recently upgraded to a standing committee with Michael Engell-Jensen, OGP Executive Director as the Management Committee sponsor. It will work with other committees to create, refine and

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communicate key messages via the appropriate medium, vet all external presentations, develop the OGP website and monitor NOIA agendas to identify areas of mutual interest. It will also establish a communications ‘radar’ to monitor the oil and gas sphere in order to react to new issues when they first appear.The committee held its first meeting in October with thirteen participants. ‘It was a great turnout’ says Andrew, adding, ‘new members are very welcome to join. I am keen that the committee is internationally representative. We will ensure that members can participate even if they cannot physically attend meetings.’ Participation in the committee will give members the opportunity to help shape and deliver OGP’s communications programme at a time when the industry is increasingly under pressure to communicate and be transparent. It also allows individuals to share best practise and to learn how other companies approach communications issues and challenges.’Andrew hopes that the committee can ‘work with the secretariat to provide a communications service that is commensurate with the expected standard in the international oil and gas industry.’ It has already decided to create a communications framework and a calendar to better anticipate promotional opportunities. A process for developing messages, and a library of images, is also planned.‘To be the voice you need to be effective, and this means a fast response’, explains Andrew. ’The development of a communications framework will add value to committees by helping them disseminate their achievements quickly.’ The calendar of events will leverage OGP’s committee work by allowing the communications committee to plan ahead in order to

meet the communications needs of technical committees. The Secretariat will maintain the calendar. It is envisaged that it will list what issues each committee is working will allow OGP anticipate and target our communications better using the range of modern media available to us such as internet advertisng and social media.The next meeting of the Communications Committee will take place in Brussels in January. Any member interested in joining the committee should contact their member representative and send an email to Danny Walsh, Assistant Communications Manager: danny.walsh@ogp.org.uk.

Noble Energy joins OGP

US-based Noble Energy, Inc. has joined OGP. Founded 80

years ago, it was one of the first independent producers to explore in the Gulf of Mexico and today its business interests cover the US, the Gulf of Mexico, offshore West Africa and offshore Israel and Cyprus in the Eastern Mediterranean. It is a S&P 500 company with reserves of 1.2 billion barrels of oil equivalent and assets totalling over $16 billion at year-end 2011.Many of Noble Energy’s exploration discoveries are now reaching completion, giving it the confidence to project double-digit annual reserve, production and cash flow growth over the next five years.The OGP member representative is Ben Dillon, Vice-President, Communications and Government Relations. He is based in Houston, USA.

New report recommends well control improvements to industry

An OGP report has recommended ways that the oil & gas industry can

improve well control. OGP Report N° 476 Recommendations for enhancements to well control training, examination and certification was published by a task force of the Wells Expert Committee (WEC) in October.

The OGP Human Factors Task Force of the Wells Expert Committee, with input from the International Well Control Forum and the International Association of Drilling Contractors, wrote the report, which contains recommended improvements to current well control training, examination and certification processes, and some of the related philosophies that should be adopted throughout the industry to improve well control preparedness and performance for all types of operations conducted on all wells worldwide. Some of the key recommendations include:• Training on barrier management and

risk management be included in well control training.

• Training on well influx detection and immediate response be improved.

• Training adapted to better suit the well operation, rig type and role of the person involved with a well operation.

• Minimum levels of training be specified for personnel that may contribute to the avoidance of, response to, or mitigation of a well control situation.

• Scenario or simulator based training be evolved and adopted to complement existing training.

• General improvements be made to the technical content of the training syllabuses.

• Learning, examination and certification processes be improved.

• A more systematic auditing process be adopted to assure training goals are consistently achieved.

The main part of this report highlights improvements that are expected to be adopted by current well control training, examination and certification bodies. However, management from oil and gas operating companies, drilling contractors and service companies demonstrate continued support for the recommendations in order to drive them through to implementation.The authors note that some of the recommendations in the report already exist within the industry or are under development. Any such repetition was intended to endorse support towards consistent application throughout the industry, the report says.The WEC is part of a Global Reponse Group (GIRG) formed by OGP in response to the Macondo and Montara well control incidents. Besides prevention, GIRG addressed well control incident management focused on intervention and response issues.Hard copies of the report were made available at the recent EGM. Those not attending will receive it in the post.

Security of energy supply on the agenda at Security meeting in Brussels

Over 20 members of the Security Committee met in Brussels to

address the subject ‘security of energy supply’ at OGP’s offices on 02-03 October and co-hosted by GdF Suez. Kevin Buckley of INPEX and Bill Forbes of Woodside traveled from Australia to attend. According to Chairman Jean-Louis Kibort of Total, the attendance reflected the global reach of OGP membership.The meeting was structured to have a range of external guest speakers give their view on that topic, then for the members of the Security Committee to meet in a workshop to discuss the topic and determine a strategic plan to address the security issues of energy supply in the oil & gas sector.The speakers were:• Rachel Bonfante of OGP in Brussels;• Jose Perez, Policy Officer, DG Energy,

EU Commission;

• Alexandros Yannis, European External Action Service;

• Paul Beat, Global Director, Control Risks;

• Dr Frank Umbach EUCERS, Kings College London.

Prior to a group dinner, members visited the Royal Museum of Belgian Armed Forces and Military History in central Brussels. ‘It was a magnificent venue, and, considering many of the committee members have a military past, was like letting children loose in a toy store,’ says Stewart Fraser, Security & Health Manager at OGP.

The dinner was opened with a speech by Dr Jamie Shea, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Emerging Security Challenges NATO, who gave a global view of the political issues and international uncertainties that may affect the security of energy supply in decades to come.The workshop developed several action items to be addressed by task forces; security management systems, measurement, kidnapping, security in operations.It is worth mentioning that OGP staff in Brussels provided excellent support which led to the success of this event. The next Security Committee meeting will take place in Vienna in March 2013.

Environmental performance Indicators report increases transparency

In an effort to enable benchmarking and increase transparency in the

upstream oil & gas industry, for the past 13 years OGP’s Environment Committee has been collecting data from member companies on an annual basis. The latest edition of OGP’s Environmental Performance Indicators, covering 2011 environmental data, is now available.

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Istanbul hosts OGP EGM

Istanbul was the venue for OGP’s EGM this month, and BP Turkey was the host company. The two-day event began on Wednesday, November 7th, and took place at the centrally-located Intercontinental Ceylan Istanbul Hotel. It featured a

packed agenda for OGP members who were asked to review and endorse the 2013 budget and business plan, heard presentations from all committees and were updated on OGP’s work and accomplishments.On the first day attendees were addressed by TPAO Chairman and President Mehmet Uysal.A full report will feature in next month’s newsletter.

Brad Corson, OGP Chairman opens proceedings Brad with TPAO Chairman & President Mehmet Uysal

Istanbul, a stunning host city

The participants of the final day workshop

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Recent & Forthcoming meetings

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Committee Date Electrical Standards Task Force 01 NovEGM 07-08 NovGeomatics Committee 12 NovWells BOP Task Force 14 NovGas from Shale Task Force 14 NovGeomatics P6 Task Force 21 NovMarine Strategy Task Force 26 NovWells Committee 27-28 NovMaterial Standards Subcommittee 27-28 NovAPI/OGP International Standards Task Force 03-04 DecInstrumentation & Automation Subcommittee 04-05 DecAPI/OGP International Standards Task Force 11-12 DecInstrument Package Control Integration TF 13 DecGas Work Group 14 DecWells Committee 18 DecWells Incident Database Task Force 19 DecOffice Closed 25 Dec-01 Jan

The report covers information on the upstream activities of 41 OGP member companies working in 75 countries. Five of these companies are reporting for the first time. The data have been aggregated at both global and regional levels and are expressed within 6 environmental indictor categories:• Gaseous emissions• Energy consumption• Flaring• Aqueous discharges• Discharges of non-aqueous drilling

fluids retained on cuttings; and• Spills of oil and chemicals

The report shows that, for every thousand tonnes of hydrocarbon production, participating companies reported emissions of 133 tonnes of carbon dioxide and 1.25 tonnes of methane equating to 159 tonnes of greenhouse gas, 0.5 tonnes of non-methane volatile organic compounds, 0.2 tonnes of sulphur dioxide and 0.4 tonnes of nitrogen oxide. These are broadly similar to 2010 figures.The participating companies consumed on average 1.6 Gigajoules of energy for every tonne of hydrocarbon produced, a 7% increase compared with the 2010 average. As in previous

years, the data indicate that onshore production in 2011 was more energy intensive than offshore production.For every thousand tonnes of hydrocarbons produced, 15.7 tonnes of gas was flared. This is an improvement over 16.0 tonnes in 2010 and 17.6 tonnes in 2009. The reduction is predominantly driven by major infrastructure improvement projects in Africa that increase the capability to inject gas for reservoir maintenance and to deliver gas to market. Reductions in flaring translate to reductions in CO2 and other gaseous emission rates.The average concentration of oil in produced water discharged figures for 2011 show a 10% reduction from 2010 figures. The average quantity of oil discharged per unit of hydrocarbon production decreased by 7%.There were 35,481 tonnes of non-aqueous base fluids retained on cuttings discharged to sea.In 2011, participating companies reported that the average quantity of oil spilled was 7.9 tonnes per million tonnes production.To download the full document, OGP Environmental Performance Indicators 2011 data, visit the publications page of: www.ogp.org.uk.