Offshore staff
ABERDEEN, UK – The Oil & Gas Innovation Centre (OGIC) sees growing interest in supporting development of emerging technologies in the North Sea.
Over the past year, OGIC claims, new technologies have presented opportunities to resolve on-going issues facing the market, with companies reappraising their levels of R&D in order to gain a competitive advantage.
Examples include seeking more cost-effective ways of managing decommissioning, which is forecast to take place on 349 fields across the North Sea area over the next decade.
Ian Phillips, OGIC’s chief executive, said: “By helping companies find appropriate research expertise within the Scottish university system, in addition to funding, companies are now benefiting from working hand-in-hand with cutting edge research departments, such as Oceans Systems Laboratory at Heriot-Watt University and the Petroleum Engineering Research Group at Robert Gordon University.
“We believe that providing access to more cost effective early stage research, often on unproven technologies when there’s a higher risk of the concept not working, is helping to stimulate ideas for more innovative solutions – especially as the ‘regret cost’ is significantly reduced if it fails.”
At the end of 2017, OGIC had invested £2.3 million ($3.2 million) in collaborative projects which was supplemented by private sector funding totaling £5.4 million ($7.5 million).
Various projects have since moved on to theOil & Gas Technology Centre (OGTC), also in Aberdeen, for further development and field testing.
By the end of last month, OGIC had signed up four new projects and continues to receive a wide range of applications for innovative technologies, many designed to capitalize on the next phase of economic recovery.
Phillips added: “To accelerate the process of bringing a project from idea to market, we need to continue to work together as a sector and use all the tools and resources currently available to companies active within the UK continental shelf.”
02/23/2018
