Bookings Opened for Annual Offshore Decommissioning Conference (UK)

Bookings have officially opened for the annual Offshore Decommissioning Conference organised by Decom North Sea in partnership with Oil & Gas UK.

This year’s event, sponsored by Ernst & Young LLP, will be held at the Fairmont Hotel, St Andrews, on 2-3 October. With annual expenditure for North Sea decommissioning projects forecast to top £1billion in the coming years, this year’s event will focus on collaboration and promoting knowledge share and best practices among operators and supply chain members.

The annual event follows on from three previous sell-out conferences, with more than 300 delegates from the UK, Norway, The Netherlands and the USA attending the 2012 conference.

The two conference days feature a full schedule of workshops and presentations including market updates on global decommissioning, well abandonment, industry initiatives and an investigation of the future of the industry. The programme will also feature case studies on collaboration as well as a panel debate on the subject.

The conference will be chaired jointly by Brian Nixon, Decom North Sea’s chief executive, and Mick Borwell, Oil & Gas UK’s environmental issues director. They will be joined by a line-up of industry experts, who will share their knowledge of decommissioning and encourage delegates to participate in a range of interactive discussions on topical issues including current and projected decommissioning levels, lessons learned from recent major projects and collaboration and re-use.

Nixon said: “This flagship event in the decommissioning calendar benefits greatly from the expert advice and commitment we receive from our organising committee, and as a result we have seen year on year growth in interest. The 2013 Conference promises to be beneficial for all sectors of the industry, and will be a perfect opportunity to meet decision-makers, share knowledge and best practice, and to understand how forthcoming business opportunities will be contracted.” 

Borwell said: “Our decommissioning conference takes place in the context of a vibrant oil and gas industry in which a number of major investments are under way. However, while the industry focuses on recovering the estimated 24 billion barrels of oil equivalent that remain, a steady flow of decommissioning projects represents a parallel and growing business opportunity for the UK supply chain. This event provides the ideal opportunity for delegates to prepare themselves for the challenges ahead and gain an insight into the latest topical issues.”

The event is open to non-members as well as members of DNS and Oil & Gas UK.

DNS has grown since its inception in 2010 to have more than 220 members drawn from operators, major contractors, service specialists and technology developers. DNS was set up to tackle the main areas of weakness, which are inhibiting decommissioning supply-chain capability.

Oil & Gas UK is the leading representative organisation for the UK offshore oil and gas industry. Its growing membership, which comprises oil and gas producers and contractor companies, now numbers more than 350.

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