Responding to consultant Ian Fitzsimmons' recent remarks in OE about BP's accident investigation report on the Gulf of Mexico's Macondo well disaster, drilling specialist Dr John Thorogood argues that it's time to stop pointing the accusatory finger and start learning the human factors lesson鈥
All alarms exist for a reason, but in many offshore assets too many alarms can be worse than too few. Amor Group鈥檚 Brendon Glass explains why.In today鈥檚 automated plants or platforms, thousands of alarms have been configured into the control system鈥
Ageing FPSOs present naval architect with GL 鈥 installed March 2000 in 90m potential safety challenges that the oil & gas industry is only now coming to terms with, according to GL Noble Denton. 鈥楾here have been over 200 floating production system deployments鈥
When setting out to reshape itself from a jack-of-all-trades drilling contractor to one with a deepwater future, Pride International realized it had to do more than simply change up its fleet. With deepwater assets tending to feature longer contract cycles than shallow and mid-water rigs鈥
On the heels of strong 2Q earnings, including a revenue boost of 11% from international markets, Halliburton executive Tim Probert talks to OE about oilfield technology trends, the Deepwater Horizon disaster and how 鈥楤ig Red' is positioning itself as a truly international company鈥
For more than 20 years, the UK鈥檚 Civil Aviation Authority has led various initiatives to reduce the risks to helicopters operating to moving platforms in the North Sea. Dr Athena Scaperdas and Dr Paul Gallagher of Atkins describe one such project which looks at helicopter on-deck safety鈥
Ultimately, the life of existing offshore assets will have to be extended, safely and reliably, and balancing production against integrity requires a comprehensive understanding of those assets and the use of management strategies that engage employees at all levels鈥
BP has come under fierce criticism for its response to the Macondo blowout, a months-long saga of top hats, riser insertion tools and other containment efforts that only began collecting a significant portion of the oil spilling into the Gulf several weeks after the event鈥
Four of the largest oil companies have pledged $1 billion to build a rapid response system designed to capture and contain oil in the event of another Macondo-style blowout in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico.In a July 21 joint announcement, Chevron鈥
Unfair though it may seem, it is conceivable that the Macondo incident will have at least as damaging and persistent an impact on the offshore industry as Chernobyl does on the nuclear power industry. Professor Andrew C Palmer explains why.On鈥
Partnerships and acquisitions are but one facet of the contractors' race to supply seabed separation, boosting and processing services. Materials science, marinization and redundancy also play a part in their efforts to make reliable seabed-to-shore systems a reality鈥
Eleven proposals will receive a cut of $10 million in funding from the Research Partnership to Secure Energy for America (RPSEA) under its ultradeepwater program. The proposed technologies are aimed at improving safety, minimizing environmental impact鈥
Nigeria鈥檚 controversial oil reforms, long in the works, appear close to passage. The government hopes to shore up falling production and get a bigger share of oil profits. But IOCs doing business in the Delta are wary, as Russell McCulley reports鈥
Since Heerema Marine Contractors introduced its Incident & Injury Free initiative in 2008 for both its own personnel (offshore and onshore) and the subcontractors they work with, reactions from clients and contractors have been very positive and the results have been impressive鈥
