Finding Oil in Atlantic Basins
.......do exponentiating drilling costs spell the END, despite remaining opportunities?
£50
FEATURED SPEAKERS
Mike Dyson
» Director, Oil & Gas Practice
» Navigant
Andrei Belopolsky
» Brazil Exploration Manager
» Premier Oil
Full Agenda
Wednesday, May 27, 2015
London
The Geological Society
Download our conference report

In the Geological Society, London, on May 27th, we explored the idea that we might be able to improve the way we look for oil in the North and South Atlantic by developing new methods.
Or to state the opposite, perhaps the disappointing results from the Transform Margin west of Ghana, Namibia, French Guiana, Mauritania, Morocco and the North Atlantic (except Canada) have been due to the fact that explorers are only using an old set of ideas.
Chaired by Andrew Lodge, exploration director of Premier Oil, the conference included a talk from Premier Oil on potential in the Ceará basin on the Brazilian Equatorial margin;
Mike Dyson of Navigant, and a former general manager of well engineering with BG Group, on how to reduce the costs of exploration wells.
Also Neftex, LR Senergy, Getech, TGS and CGG, on opportunities in the North and South Atlantic.
Introduction from conference producer David Bamford
Once we move away from the Gulf of Mexico, successful deep water oil E & P has been enjoyed mainly in the basins of the South Atlantic – Angola and Brazil above all; Ghana; Nigeria to some extent.
Elsewhere has been disappointing – the Transform Margin west of Ghana; Namibia; French Guiana; Mauritania and Morocco….
Equally, the North Atlantic – offshore Canada aside – has been disappointing so far.
So is the game now over?
Or is it that everybody has simply been pursuing the same ideas – “Girassol – lookalikes”, “Jubilee – lookalikes”, “Brazil sub-salt – lookalikes” and so on – and what we actually need are some NEW IDEAS?
David Bamford
Andrew is now a Principal at StrategicFit and a Non-Executive Director at Egdon Resources.
Previously, he joined Premier Oil plc’s Board as Exploration Director in April 2009 from Hess where he was Vice President, Exploration, responsible for Europe, North Africa, Asia and Australia for nine years. Prior to that, he was Vice President, Exploration, Asset Manager and Group Exploration Advisor for BHP Petroleum, based in London and Australia. Prior to joining BHP Petroleum, Andrew worked for BP as a geophysicist. He has an honours degree in Mining Geology from the University of Wales and a Masters in Applied Geophysics from the University of Leeds. He is a fellow of the Geological Society.
He retired from Premier Oil in June 2015.
StrategicFit StrategicFit is a strategy consulting firm specialising in the upstream oil and gas industry. More... | |
|
Sarah Laird joined Neftex in 2007 as part of a team working on the regional geology of the Indian Subcontinent. Since 2010 she has worked as a geoscientist with a focus on Europe, with a particular interest in the geology of the North Atlantic and the Adriatic, and presently works as a regional geoscientist with a focus on both large scale global projects and smaller scale regional projects. Sarah has a BSc from the University of St. Andrews.
Landmark Exploration Insights Landmark Exploration Insights (formerly Neftex), is a product family within Landmark, a business lin More... | |
|
Joanne is an exploration geophysicist with 20 years experience of working in the oil industry. Her early career was spent working with Landmark, later bought out by Halliburton, moving around between England, Norway and Scotland.
Nine years ago she joined PGL, later bought out by LR Senergy, where she has had the opportunity to work on a diverse range of projects and regions including North Sea, West of Shetlands, Mauritania, Brazil and Argentina.
Joanne is currently the Exploration Team Leader in Aberdeen and has responsibility for the Ternan group of reports and studies, producing non-proprietary regional studies. The Ternan brand is now well established, with a strong reputation for producing high quality regional reports based on play fairway analysis.
LR Senergy LR Senergy is an integrated exploration, production and energy services consultancy providing techni More... | |
|
|
Mike Dyson is a Director in Navigant’s global Oil & Gas practice based in London, UK. Mike brings more than 30 years’ experience in the upstream oil and gas business, having worked in Shell and BG Group exploration and production (E&P) companies around the world. His core expertise is in well and production operations, capital projects, supply chain strategies and new technology development and implementation. He provides consulting advice to oil & gas E&P companies looking to improve their business performance, and is a strong advocate of holistic and sustainable improvement by tackling all elements of transformation. These include rigorous operations planning and execution, collaborative working across the supply chain, application of new technology, teamwork communications and personal leadership.
Navigant Our global Oil & Gas team provides deep industry experience combined with functional expertise and g More... | |
|
Talk Description
In 2012 TGS acquired over 28,000 km of 2D seismic data over the Mauritania, Senegal, The Gambia, Guinea Bissau and Guinea Conakry (MSGBC) Basin on the North West African Atlantic Margin (NWAAM). Recent drilling success in the basin with over a Billion barrels of oil discovered last year has increased industry interest in this relatively unexplored region, with less than one well every 6000 sq. km. The basin is roughly a third the size of the Gulf of Mexico and extends from onshore to water depths of up to 4000 m. The southern boundary of the basin is marked by the Guinea Transform Fault and the northern margin is delineated by the Moroccan Reguibat Shield. |
Ben is a petroleum geologist with over 10 years upstream industry experience. He has been focussed on Africa for the majority of his career with recent focus on the North West Atlantic Margin. Ben has an MSc in Petroleum Geoscience from Royal Holloway and a BSc in Geography & GIS from University of Greenwich; previously employed for a Moroccan-based operator Ben now works for TGS and is based in their London office.
TGS TGS is the world's largest geoscience data company, known for its asset-light, multi-client business More... | |
|
|
Matthew has worked as a Geoscientist at ERCL (now part of the Getech Group) for the past 8 months. Prior to this he has achieved a Merit level MSc. in Structural Geology with Geophysics at the University of Leeds. It was during this year (2014) he gained his first real exposure to the Oil and Gas industry as an intern at Bowleven, looking at the structural evolution of the onshore Douala Basin. Prior to this, he obtained a 1st class honours degree in Geology with Physical Geography from Keele University in 2013. Upon graduation he received the Best Undergraduate in Geophysics award from the British Geophysical Association, and the PESGB’s Scholar’s Award.
Getech For over 25 years, we've been using our data and geoscience expertise to help the oil and mining ind More... | |
|
Talk Description Exploration in the Ceará basin, on the south-western part of the Equatorial Margin of Brazil, commenced in the early 1970s. Several moderate size fields such as Xaréu, Curimã, Atum, and Espada Fields, with URR volume of around 200 MM BOE, were discovered on the shelf and are producing to this day. Exploration in the deep water part of the basin has been sparse (only 5 wells in water depth greater than 1000 m to date) with some success but, most importantly, de-risked the working petroleum system. With significant part of the deep water acreage licenced to operators in the 11th bid round in 2013, the basin is now embarking on the new exciting phase of exploration. Ceará basin sedimentary fill is divided into three mega-sequences: syn-rift, transitional and drift. The basin is blessed with world-class source rocks of Aptian to Turonian age developed within all three main megasequeces. The Transitional megasequence contains both the source rocks and the reservoirs. This play was tested by the Pecem discovery in 2012 by Petrobras on the flank of a large structural high. Reservoir quality and connectivity remain the main uncertainty for this play. Other plays include a structural play with reservoirs in the syn-rift sandstones (Mundaú formation), and the Upper Cretaceous turbidite slope channel/canyons. In addition, in the outboard blocks onlap wedge plays in the Transitional early lower part of the drift megasequence have been identified. These plays could be analogous to the successfully tested plays on the conjugate margin in West Africa.
Premier Oil plc (Premier) and partner CEPSA have won two exploration licences (Blocks CE-M-717 and CE-M-665) in the 11th bid round and are now the dominant acreage holders in Ceará basin. The Premier JV has reprocessed two existing 3D surveys resulting in an improved definition of both the syn-rift and drift section and imaging of new prospects and leads. A multi-client 3D survey using broadband technology is planned for 2015 which is expected to result in a superior seismic image in time for impacting the exploration drilling programme in 2017.
|
Andrei Belopolsky is Brazil Exploration manager at Premier Oil in London where he is responsible for managing both operated and non-operated exploration assets in Brazil, as well as evaluating growth opportunities. Prior to this role, Andrei was New Ventures Manager at Premier evaluating opportunities in the Mediterranean, East Africa, and Central and South America, and leading the company’s entry into Brazil by capturing 3 blocks in the 2013 bid round. Andrei joined Premier Oil in early 2011 after spending over 10 years at BP, first in Houston in a variety of technical roles in the Gulf of Mexico, onshore US, and the technology teams, then in London working in the New Ventures/Access and offshore Libya teams. Andrei has a Ph.D. in Geology and Geophysics from Rice University in Houston, an M.A. in Geology from Binghamton University in New York State, and a B.A. in Geology from Moscow State University. He is a member of AAPG and a fellow of the Geological Society, a member of the Editorial Board of Petroleum Geoscience, and served as a member of Petroleum Group committee between 2011 and 2014.
Premier Oil Premier Oil plc is a leading independent oil and gas company with producing interests in the UK, Ind More... | |
|
Neil Hodgson is VP Searcher Seismic, a company which provides high quality exploration data and leading edge tech to the global exploration industries. He is formerly executive VP geoscience with Spectrum ASA, and exploration manager at Matra Petroleum, Premier Oil and GB Group.
Searcher Seismic Searcher provides high quality exploration data and leading edge tech to the global exploration indu More... | |
|