BG Group warned of further job cuts and budget slashing yesterday as it also revealed it had wiped £4billion off the value of oil and gas assets globally to reflect the sharp fall in crude prices.
UK North Sea output was up by about 5% in 2014 as BG slumped to pre-tax losses of £1.5billion, from profits of £2.58million a year earlier. Revenue and other income was 2% higher at £12.9billion.
Ernst den Hartigh, managing director of European exploration and production, said: “We safely increased production for a second successive year. Our priorities for 2015 are to complete the offshore investment campaign we started last autumn and ensure we reduce operating costs to a more sustainable level.”
Falklands oil explorers will start their 2015 drilling campaign in March, shaking off concerns about low crude prices and sending their shares higher.
Drilling for oil and gas in the resource-rich Falklands area by London-listed companies remains controversial as a decades-long row between the UK and Argentina over the sovereignty of the islands has not been resolved.
Rockhopper and Falkland Oil and Gas said yesterday their shared drilling rig was being moved from west Africa to start work in the first week of March.
There are too few women entering, staying in and reaching the highest levels of the energy industry, a new report says.
Professional services firm PwC and industry body POWERful Women (PfW) reveal research findings showing just 5% of executive boards seats among the top 100 UK-headquartered energy firms are held by women.
More than three in five of the firms (61%) have no women on their boards at all.
Profits at Ashtead Technology jumped by almost 40% after the Aberdeenshire-based subsea machinery supplier invested a record amount in rental equipment.
The company pumped £10.1million into its capital expenditure programme in the year to April 30, 2014,up from £9million in the previous 12 months and the highest tally since the business was founded 29 years ago.
Operating profits rose to £13.6million, from £9.7million previously, on the back of a 23% increase in turnover to £27.4million.
Norwegian energy service giant Aker Solutions said yesterday the current phase of its work on Premier Oil’s Solan development in the UK North Sea would end on February 27.
About 280 contractors who were recruited for the work on temporary terms have been notified about the end date, which was determined by the planned departure of the Safe Scandinavia accommodation vessel.
Safe Scandinavia is leaving for another project later than expected, with Aker having previously anticipated it would be available only until sometime this month.
The new energy jobs taskforce, launched by First Minister Nicola Sturgeon earlier this month in response to tumbling oil prices, will meet for the first time in Aberdeen today.
Chaired by Scottish Enterprise (SE) chief executive Lena Wilson, it will focus on jobs across the entire energy industry but with an initial emphasis on the oil and gas sector.
Membership includes industry bodies and commercial interests as well as cross-government representation.
North Sea helicopter manufacturer Airbus Helicopters is betting on military deals to lift orders as the plunge in the price of crude hits demand from oil explorers.
The French company, which is part of aerospace and defence giant Airbus Group, said yesterday it expected stabilisation in the industry during 2015.
Its new helicopter deliveries fell by 5.2% to 471 last year, while net sales fell by 20 units to 402.
The north-east can become a carbon capture and storage (CCS) “powerhouse” of Europe, benefiting from job creation and other economic rewards as the fledgling industry takes off, seminar delegates will hear today.
Chaired by Aberdeen Harbour Board chief executive Colin Parker, the event throws the spotlight on new CCS opportunities facing the region as it battles to overcome a big slump in oil prices.
But it will also highlight concerns about the dangers of any sluggish action from Westminster in getting projects off the ground.
Oilfield technology company Plexus Holdings is on the brink of a major breakthrough in the global subsea industry, bosses said yesterday.
Engineering and testing stages for its new subsea wellhead system are well advanced and the firm is preparing to take on the main players who currently dominate the market.
Craig Hendrie and Graham Stevens, technical and finance director respectively, also highlighted the firm’s progress in adapting its innovative Pos-Grip technology for use in high-pressure, high-temperature (HPHT) exploration well tiebacks.
North-east oil and gas pipeline engineering specialist Stats Group is preparing for further international expansion after securing an additional £4.3million investment from the Business Growth Fund (BGF).
Bosses have also invested more cash in the business, which had an initial £7.8million of BGF funding in March 2012.
Since the initial deal, the firm has doubled its annual turnover to around £30million, created 145 new jobs and opened operational bases in Canada, the Middle East and US.
OEG Offshore said yesterday it had recruited chartered accountant Adrian Bannister from fellow Aberdeen firm Viking Seatech to become its new chief financial officer (CFO).
Mr Bannister has been CFO at Viking, which carries out engineering services including mooring analysis and modelling for rig locations and moves, and recently diversified into broader asset-management work since 2012.
He was previously CEO at both Stork Technical Services and Sparrows Offshore Group.
ITC Hydraulics has launched a new rental division, investing more than £200,000 to get it up and running.
The firm, which deigns, manufactures, services and refurbishes a range of specialist equipment for clients including Subsea 7, Aker Solutions and Oceaneering, said it was seeing increased demand for rentals.
It previously sub-contracted rental work but is now taking it all in-house.
Work on EnQuest’s new North Sea headquarters in Aberdeen is proceeding as planned despite the firm’s plunging share price and oil and gas industry woes.
It is understood that there is no threat to the development in the heart of the Granite City, where EnQuest’s new north-east home – Annan House – is taking shape.
It is part of a bigger project, known as The Grande, which is helping to regenerate a long-neglected part of Aberdeen.
Aberdeen energy service firm Hydro Group has invested £300,000 in a fancy new piece of kit to help it make tougher underwater cables for the oil and gas industry.
The company said yesterday it had installed and commissioned an advanced armouring line at its Bridge of Don facility, becoming one of only a few UK businesses to have the technology.
Hydro Group, which designs and manufactures cables and connectors for subsea and onshore use, said its custom-designed single and multi-layered steel armoured cables were able to withstand higher stresses in subsea and defence operations.
Sir Ian Wood insists the North Sea industry is not facing a doomsday scenario and can recover with the help of a big tax cut in the March Budget.
The north-east oil and gas doyen said there was little point in swifter action from the Treasury as it would have no impact at current oil prices of about $50 a barrel.
But a clear commitment by the chancellor to a “measured” reduction of at least 10% to the supplementary tax on profits in the Budget and more cuts to follow would encourage operators to keep project teams together and not give up on the North Sea, he said.
Norwegian oil giant Statoil has awarded the management contract for the floating storage unit (FSU) for its £4billion-plus Mariner project in the UK North Sea to offshore service firm OSM Offshore Aberdeen.
The value of the contract, which starts on February 1 and will last for five years, with three further option periods of two years each, was undisclosed.
However, industry sources said it was a “significant”.
Bond Offshore Helicopters boss Luke Farajallah will leave his role next month, it was revealed yesterday.
A replacement has been recruited. Michelle Handforth, currently general manager of Sydney Ferries in Australia, will take over the role at the North Sea helicopter firm in April.
Better late than never as they say and yesterday’s announcement of start-up from Total’s West Franklin Phase 2 project more than a year behind schedule is a much-needed boost for the North Sea industry.
Total said it had started gas and condensate production to supply 40,000 barrels of oil equivalent (boe) per day to the Elgin/Franklin hub.
Michael Borrell, senior vice president exploration and production, Europe and central Asia, added: “With the start-up of the West Franklin Phase 2 project, Total consolidates the production capacity of its operated Elgin/Franklin hub.
New contracts for the oil and gas industry and also search and rescue (SAR) operations helped spur on Bristow Helicopters to a massive increase in profits.
Pre-tax profits of £91million in the 12 months to March 31, 2014, were up from £6.35million a year earlier. Turnover rocketed by 26% to £318.19million in the latest period, from £252.52million previously.
A spokeswoman for the firm said a number of factors drove the rise in profits.
North Sea oil firm Canadian Natural Resources (CNR) slashed its spending plan for 2015 yesterday as the price of crude continued to fall.
Calgary-based CNR, whose operations also cover North America and Africa, said it was cutting its budget for this year by £1.6billion to £4billion.
It cited the plunging oil prices as the reason, but other factors are also dictating how much the firm spends and where.
A job cull at Cairn Energy has seen about two-fifths of staff and contractors axed, the Scottish oil explorer revealed.
About 90 people have gone, although most chose to take voluntary redundancy.
The cuts were made across Edinburgh-based Cairn’s international operations, and leave the company with around 190 staff and contractors.
Falling crude prices are a “shot in the arm” for many global economies, an investment trust chief said yesterday.
Andrew Bell, chief executive of the Chelmsford-based Witan Investment Trust was among a string of bosses delivering their views on the oil price plunge on behalf of a group representing UK investment trusts responsible for assets worth about £122billion.
He said: “The fall in the oil price is a shot in the arm for oil consuming economies, despite the so far rather sulky response of equity markets.
North Sea oil and gas company Ithaca Energy expects to spend nearly 60% less than last year as it moves towards production start-up from its Greater Stella Area (GSA) development during 2015.
The Aberdeen-based firm expects Greater Stella, which is in the heart of the Central Graben area of the central UK North Sea, to come on-stream in the third quarter of this year.
Ithaca said its reduced spending – it is budgeting for just over £99million this year, which it said was nearly 60% less than last year – reflected the advanced status of its GSA investment programme and lower output enhancement costs.
A mineral used as a weighting agent for drilling fluids in oil and gas exploration could be mined at a new site in Scotland under plans unveiled by oilfield service firm M-I Swaco yesterday.
The company, part of energy service giant Schlumberger, said the "world-class" project at Duntanlich, near Aberfeldy in Perthshire, would create about 30 skilled jobs and indirect employment opportunities for local suppliers and contractors.
Duntanlich is a replacement for the company's existing mine at nearby Foss, which has operated since 1985.
UK North Sea spending levels could slump to just over half their 2014 total over the next two years, with low oil prices alone costing the industry £2billion of lost investment, according to energy research company Wood Mackenzie.
The warning in WoodMac’s latest annual UK upstream review comes after a continued “boom” in offshore investment in 2014.
A total of £12billion was pumped into offshore projects last year, keeping the UK in the top 10 countries for upstream spending worldwide, WoodMac said.
