Risk of Contract Growth and Opportunistic Behavior

This paper explores the risk associated with contract growth and opportunistic behavior in contractors with a special focus on the management of changes and interfaces. The study compares two successful megaprojects, the Gudrun oil platform by Statoil in the North Sea and the ATLAS detector at CERN. The empirical data were obtained using in-depth interviews with key personnel at Statoil and CERN. The study makes three significant contributions to knowledge: (1) megaprojects can benefit from having a high level of staffing since management costs are relatively small compared to construction costs; (2) when part of the end design is left to contractors, the contractors are given an opening to act in an opportunistic manner, which can cause contract growth; and (3) when a high level of integration is performed in-house, companies can take an extreme cost-driven approach to contracting.

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Extending Production Life of Mature Fields in the North Sea with Multilateral Technology

10.2118/205874-ms ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Matthew Kelsey ◽

Magnus Raaholt ◽

Olav Einervoll ◽

Rustem Nafikov ◽

Stian Amble

Keyword(s):

Environmental Impact ◽

North Sea ◽

Construction Costs ◽

The North ◽

Economic Production ◽

Successful Case ◽

Isolation Methods ◽

Cumulative Production ◽

The North Sea

Abstract Multilateral technology has for nearly three decades extended the production life of fields in the North Sea by delivering a higher recovery factor supported by the cumulative production of the multiple laterals. Additionally, operators continue to look at methods to reduce the environmental impact of drilling and intervention. Taking advantage of the latest multilateral technology can turn otherwise unviable reservoirs into economically sound targets by achieving a longer field life while minimizing construction costs, risk, and environmental impact. This paper will focus on mature fields in the region that have used multilateral applications for wells that were reaching the end of their life and have been extended to further economic production. This paper discusses challenges faced to provide a multilateral solution for drilling new lateral legs in existing wells where there is a lack of available slots to drill new wells. Additionally, discussion will cover completion designs that tie new laterals into existing production casing. The case study will include discussion of workover operations, isolation methods, and lateral creation systems. The paper focuses on the challenges, solutions, and successful case study of a retrofit multilateral well constructed in the North Sea which extended production life in a mature field by using innovative multilateral re-entry methods. The paper also provides insight as to methodology for continually improving reliability of multilateral installations to maximize efficiencies.

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V.—Traces of a Great Post-Glacial Flood

Geological Magazine ◽

10.1017/s001675680016412x ◽

1883 ◽

Vol 10 (2) ◽

pp. 71-78

Author(s):

Henry. H. Howorth

Keyword(s):

North Sea ◽

North Atlantic ◽

Open Water ◽

The North ◽

Abundant Food ◽

The North Sea ◽

High Level

What is the burden of all these facts? Why, assuredly that the shells found in our higher marine drifts, or at least in nearly all of them, far from bespeaking conditions of climate such as can alone be fairly described as Glacial, on the contrary, speak to us of a time when the general temperature was perhaps somewhat lower than it is now, but when the North Sea and North Atlantic were filled with open water, and bathed a land where the Mammoth and the Rhinoceros could find abundant food, where the Oak and the Pine flourished, and where the rivers could sustain such molluscs as the Cyrena fluminalis. This conclusion destroys at once the basis of those who have argued that our high-level marine drifts were left where they are found by ice—either by floating bergs or a creeping ice-foot. But apart from the general conclusion which the particular collocation of shells enables us to make, quite a number of facts may be collected going to show the impossibility of ice having been the motive power which deposited such beds as those at Moel Tryfaen.

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Multifrequency backscattering properties of Atlantic herring (Clupea harengus) and Norway pout (Trisopterus esmarkii)

Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences ◽

10.1139/f07-013 ◽

2007 ◽

Vol 64 (2) ◽

pp. 362-374 ◽

Cited By ~ 23

Author(s):

Sascha M.M. Fässler ◽

Rita Santos ◽

Norma García-Núñez ◽

Paul G Fernandes

Keyword(s):

North Sea ◽

Empirical Data ◽

Ambient Pressure ◽

Clupea Harengus ◽

Atlantic Herring ◽

The North ◽

Fish Flesh ◽

Fishing Vessels ◽

The North Sea ◽

Acoustic Surveys

The multifrequency backscattering characteristics of echotraces of Atlantic herring (Clupea harengus) and Norway pout (Trisopterus esmarkii) are described. These fish cohabit similar areas of the North Sea in summer and echotraces of their schools are difficult to distinguish. Mean volume backscattering strengths at 18, 38, 120, and 200 kHz were taken from the International North Sea Herring Acoustic Surveys along with coincident pelagic trawl samples. The results indicate that echotraces of these fish species cannot be distinguished on the basis of differences in backscattering at discrete frequencies typically used in fish surveys and on fishing vessels. However, some discrimination between herring size-classes was evident. The empirical data for herring were then compared with a backscattering model for herring combining fish flesh, the swimbladder, and the effect of increased pressure at depth. Both the empirical data and model data indicate that, compared with large herring, progressively smaller herring generally have higher backscattering at the lowest frequency (18 kHz), although variability was high. According to the model, this frequency-specific signature is due to the progressively more significant contribution made by the fish body compared with the swimbladder, as the latter diminishes owing to an increase in ambient pressure in deeper water.

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