GLOBAL OFFSHORE UPDATE

One of 39 crewmen is missing after a fire that broke out on an offshore drilling-vessel near Miri in the South China Sea

An oil and gas worker on a Talos Energy LLC platform in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico was killed on Saturday, February 17 while replacing piping, the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) reported.

OKEA AS and Halliburton have announced that they have signed a well construction services agreement to implement Halliburton

Consortium has awarded FES International two contracts to supply its CALM buoy swivels. The swivel technology is said to allow the buoy to rotate fully while maintaining a leak-free joint between the subsea pipelines and vessel, during transfers of fluids such as oil, LPG, and water.

Singapore-listed commodities trader Noble Group Ltd. (N21.SG) on Thursday said it swung to a net loss in the third quarter as a steep fall in revenue hurt its operating income. Net loss in the three months ended Sept. 30 was $28.1 million, compared with a profit of $24.7 million in the same quarter last year, the company said in a statement to the Singapore Exchange. Revenue fell 38% from a year ago to $11.55 billion.

Norwegian offshore safety watchdog, the Petroleum Safety Authority (PSA), has given its consent to Statoil to drill four survey wells at the Johan Sverdrup field, offshore Norway, using the Deepsea Atlantic semi-sub rig. Statoil is the operator of the Johan Sverdrup field, which is located in the North Sea around 155 kilometers west of Karmøy in Rogaland county. Partners in the field include Lundin Norway, Petoro, Aker BP, and Maersk Oil. The PSA said on Monday that the consent was given to Statoil in order to obtain information about the reservoir conditions in the field. The safety watchdog provided two separate consents, one for one of the wells and one for the other three. The drilling, which will be done at a depth of 110-120 meters, will begin on November 1, 2016, and will last around four months. The Deepsea Atlantic, of a MODU GVA 7500 type, was built by South Korea’s DSME shipyard in 2009. The rig is classified by DNV GL, operated by Odfjell Drilling, and issued wit...

Oil services company Weatherford has agreed to pay a $140 million penalty to settle the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) claims that it inflated earnings by using deceptive income tax accounting. The agency stated on Tuesday that two of the company’s senior accounting executives at the time have agreed to settle charges that they were behind the scheme. According to the SEC’s order, Weatherford fraudulently lowered its year-end provision for income taxes by $100 million to $154 million each year so the company could better align its earnings results with its earlier-announced projections and analysts’ expectations. The SEC claims that James Hudgins, who served as Weatherford’s vice president of tax, and Darryl Kitay, who was a tax manager, made numerous post-closing adjustments to fill gaps and meet its previously disclosed effective tax rate (ETR), which is the average rate that a company is taxed on pre-tax profits. The agency further said that Weatherford re...

The new OPEC Monthly Oil Market Report is out with crude only production numbers for August 2016. All charts are through August 2016. OPEC crude only production reached 33,237,000 barrels per day in August. This includes Gabon. Algeria is in slow decline. Angola seems to be holding steady. Ecuador was sharply down in August but seems to be holding steady for the last two years. Gabon has been added to OPEC but their production is so low it will have little effect one way or the other. Iran’s increase since sanctions were lifted has slowed to a crawl. There are other problems on the horizon for Iran. They are talking about changing all their oil field contracts to “buy back” contracts. That is they want the option to nationalize all everything. This will likely cause a mass exodus of foreign oil companies from Iran and hit their production considerably. Kuwait has recovered from the problems they had in April. I expect their production ...

Maersk Drilling’s jack-up rig Mærsk Gallant has won a $24m contract from Maersk Oil for around 230 days of work in UK waters of the North Sea. The contract is expected to commence in February 2017 and will comprise the plugging and abandonment of the Leadon and James subsea oilfields. “Despite an extremely challenging market, I am glad to say that Maersk Drilling is still able to secure new contracts for our rigs. By focusing on operational excellence and technical problem solving, we strive to always be a trusted and value-adding partner for our customers,” Michael Reimer, Maersk Drilling’s head of global sales, said in a release. Mærsk Gallant is currently on contract with Total E&P Norge, which is scheduled for completion soon.

Subsea 7 said it is still reviewing its lease opportunities almost a year after it beginning downsizing its staff and closing its West Campus building.  The company revealed in October last year it would be downsizing its Aberdeenshire office as it looked to streamline costs during the oil price decline. Instead, the firm said it would “optimise” its other buildings. A spokeswoman for the company said most staff had now been moved from the West Campus and moved to both the East Campus and its Greenwell site. Subsea 7 would not confirm how many staff members the move had affected. A spokeswoman said the firm was “actively reviewing lease opportunities”. Subsea 7 currently has its east and west complex as well as its workshop and sports centre based in Westhill. The Oslo-listed company does not own the West Campus building, but had been leasing it out. A sign offering the leased spaced can be seen outside of its current premises. Last year, the offshore service giant an...

Subsea 7 has started formal one-to-one consultations with hundreds of staff in Aberdeen. The move comes after the company revealed further plans for global resizing and reduction earlier this year. The company is expected to cut 430 of its UK jobs by the end of the first quarter of next year. It’s understood an estimated 230 roles could go in Aberdeen. Staff were reportedly told of the move in July. It comes on the same day it was was revealed the company is still looking to lease out its West Campus in Aberdeenshire almost a year after it began to move staff across to other buildings. Subsea 7 currently employs 1,500 people in the UK. The company said it aims to further reduce its headcount from about 8,000 by early 2017, down from a current level of 9,200.