Scotland came a creditable second to Iceland in the final of an international student petroleum exploration competition, the roots of which lie in the Faroe Islands.
A student team from Meldrum Academy took second place after prudent investments in the UK team saw the team from Iceland benefiting and going on to scoop first prize in the last half- hour of the International OilSim final, which was staged at Imperial College, London.
James Seller, 18; Peter Hollstein and Lorna MacMillan, both 17, and Ellyn Oliver, 16, took on five other national teams from Denmark, the Faroe Islands, Greenland, Iceland and Norway to become runners-up after the finalist teams had all previously won national events that saw about 3,000 students take part for the chance to go to London for the international final.
The event, sponsored by Chevron Upstream Europe, Maersk Oil North Sea, StatoilHydro, Sagex Petroleum, Imperial College, Atlantic Airways and British Airways, saw each team simulate the role of an energy company entering a new petroleum province.
Each team was given a purse of $200million and their task was to maximise the return on their investment by exploring for oil and gas and investing in other teams’ opportunities.
The participants study seismic and other surveys, bid against the other teams for licences, form joint ventures, share risks, compete for drilling assets, contract service providers and choose where to drill wells. All the decision-making very much mirrors what would happen at a real exploration company, which means OilSim could very well sow the seeds of a future in the industry for at least some of the participants.
International training provider Simprentis developed OilSim as an oil&gas business simulation to be used in training courses and team-building events for petroleum companies around the world.
The company has had close associations with Aberdeen almost since its inception in the 1990s.