Editors Notes: ROGTEC Magazine Issue 17

Dear Readers,

A year since MIOGE, a year since the start of the global crisis proper and 11 months since we saw the giddy heights of 147 dollar oil. With Trillions having been spent to steady the collective ship, we have not so much seen the green shoots of recovery, but a bottoming out of the lack of confidence that has plagued the markets in recent months. At the time of going to press, oil had hit 60 bucks, the magical number according to some unofficial sources at the large NOC´s in Russia. As I mentioned back in November in my note for ROGTEC issue 15, the oil price was always going to drop in a global recession, but the smart money was on a slow but steady increase to a sensible barrel price.

Indeed, despite the current climate Russian operators have been keenly investing outside of the federation. Surgutneftegaz recently acquired a 21 percent stake in Hungary’s MOL from Austria’s OMV for 1.4 billion euros, TNK-BP is reported to be considering the acquisition of Zhaikmunai, a London listed producer based in Kazakhstan. Zhaikmunai produces 8,500 barrels of oil per day at the Chinarevskoye field in western Kazakhstan. Presently TNK-BP does not have upstream assets in Kazakhstan and with LUKOIL and Rosneft two Russian majors heavily involved in the region, watch this space for more TNK-BP M&A activity in former soviet republic.

Outside of Europe, in mid-April an agreement was reached between the governments of Russia and Iraq that would allow Russian oil companies to revive pre-war contracts in the Gulf state. This could give a chance to Tatneft to resume negotiations on developing two blocks in Iraq ’s western desert and to LUKOIL to reinstate its 1997 contract to develop the West Qurna-2 field under PSA terms.

Back to this issue, we have our usual blend of operator led editorial; TNK-BP look at how exponential data growth is becoming a serious issue in the oil and gas sector as a whole, and with up to 75% of their company data being stored on single copy magnetic tape, new data storage and management solutions are needed to ensure there is no future data loss. On the drilling front, we have gathered the industry’s leading service companies to discuss their opinions and technology on extended reach drilling. ERD is now being used to great effect on various fields in the region and with the price of oil climbing to a reasonable level, expect to see more on this technology adaptation. We have Rosneft looking at risk assessment during exploratory drilling at the Vankor field, SPD looking at Well Reservoir Management and Stroytransgaz looking at what technology they are using for their pipeline welding activities. With some experts predicting an impending shortage of easy oil, our special feature is heavy oil recovery, so turn to pages 80 to see the latest technologies being developed in Canada and Russia to tackle this industry challenge.

So I hope you all enjoy this issue and as always, we have a busy show schedule coming up and look forward to seeing you all at the upcoming Caspian Oil and Gas and MIOGE!