Vol. 10

Issue 1

This edition of GEO ExPro Magazine focuses on South East Asia and Petroleum Geochemistry

Columns

5 Editorial

6 Update

12 Market Update

14 Licensing Opportunities: NEW COLUMN

16 A Minute to Read

42 GEO Tourism: Along the Yangtse River

46 GEO ExPro Profile: Charles Hutchison – In Love with South-East Asia

78 Recent Advances in Technology: Broadband Technology and Beyond NEW SERIES

84 GEO Cities: Kuwait – A Trading City 86 Exploration Update

88 GEO Media: Private Empire

90 Q&A: Leading a Global Organisation

92 Hot Spot: Myanmar 94 Global Resource Management

Features

20 Cover story: GEO Chemistry – The Dark Horse Upstream

26 Exploration: The Black Sea Hots Up

32 Technology: Real Time Data Delivery 36 Seismic Foldout: Power Up! Lebanon Offshore Round

50 Exploration: The South China Sea Enigma 58 Seismic Foldout: Integration of Data in the Barents Sea

64 GEO Chemistry: Geochemical Surface Expression in the Arctic

70 Industry Issues: The World in Our Hands?

74 GEO Chemistry: XRF Analysis in the Field

Articles

Australia: Expand LNG projects?

Chevron has made two deepwater gas discoveries in the Carnarvon Basin off Western Australia that the company believes have the potential to drive expansions of its Gorgon and Wheatstone LNG Read More

Leading a global organisation

What do you think were the most exciting developments in the industry in 2012? To me, the most exciting development is realising the economic impact that unconventional plays are having Read More

Kuwait: A trading city

Kuwait City, a gleaming metropolis of designer shopping malls, hotels and restaurants, has evolved dramatically in the last couple of decades. As the capital of the state of Kuwait, it Read More

Power up!

Lebanon offshore: Promising play fairways and structures With the opening of the first Lebanese Offshore Round coming up, it is time for companies to assemble a ‘bidding dataset’ to support Read More

The Dark Horse Upstream

In 2008, Petrohawk of Houston made the now historic Texas Eagle Ford shale discovery after consulting geochemical data from a nearly forgotten 50-year-old wellbore. The basic 1950s geochemistry confirmed sufficient Read More

The Black Sea hots up

The Black Sea, which straddles south-eastern Europe and Asia Minor, has long been considered prospective for oil and gas, although this optimism is based mostly on limited drilling and modest Read More

Getting the Message Right

Join the Conversation’, followed by a plethora of social media tools (Twitter, YouTube, Facebook) is a headline seen on more than one major oil or gas company’s website – but Read More

Challenging the Industry

As discussed in our cover story, geochemistry is the unsung and under-used star of hydrocarbon exploration, despite first being employed back in the 1930s. Yet the application of this science Read More

Highly dependent on oil revenues

Algeria, with a current population of 36 million, has been an oil producing country since 1958. This was made possible by two commercial discoveries in 1956, Edjelleh and Hassi Messaoud, Read More

Unique and Fast Analysis in the Field

Field-portable x-ray fluorescence (FPXRF) is a technique that is gaining momentum and acceptance in addressing applications in various fields in geology and mining. Thousands of these instruments are currently used Read More

The World in Our Hands?

The Petroleum Society of Great Britain’s PETEX Conference, held in November last year, had one unusual draw – a debate on ‘Obtaining a Social Licence to Operate, a Challenge for Read More

Along the Yangtze river

Approaching Chóngqìng Airport from the air, you fly in over the valley alongside the city for what feels like forever. The whole place appears to be balancing on several mountains, Read More

The South China Sea enigma

The South China Sea (SCS), which spans from Singapore and the Malacca Strait in the south to the Strait of Taiwan in the north, and from Borneo and the Philippines Read More

Connecting Operators and Geologists

GeoPlacer.com is a recently launched website that connects competence-assessed wellsite and operations geologists with clients, which officially opened online registration for operators at PETEX 2012 in London. Since its unveiling Read More

Production starts in Block 31

Production began at the end of January from the BP-operated Block 31 in Angola, one of the largest subsea developments in the world. The development will produce from four oil Read More

Real-time data delivery

Real-time information has been used for quite some time in the E&P industry to help improve the safety and efficiency of well construction. The benefits are well documented and today Read More

Harper Basin Exposé

The undrilled Harper Basin lies offshore Liberia between the Liberian-Sierra Leone Basin to the north, and the Ivorian/Tano Basin to the south-east. It covers approximately 20,000 km2, extending from shelf Read More

Fully integrated geoscience group

From the beginning of February 2013, all the geoscience divisions of Fugro will be incorporated into their new home in CGG, creating a fully integrated Geoscience group which the company Read More

Pipeline attacks in Nigeria

Attacks on pipelines have become commonplace in the oil-rich Niger Delta, and are symptomatic of the unrest in that volatile province. Previously the attacks were often the work of militants, Read More

Lofoten Island drilling nearer?

As discussed in GEO ExPro Vol. 9 No. 5, the seas around Norway’s remote northern Lofoten Islands remain the largest unopened section of the Norwegian Atlantic Ocean, and environmentalists are Read More

Kenya: Discovery in Block 13T

Only the second prospect to be tested in the onshore north-west Kenyan Lokichar Trough as part of Tullow Oil’s multi-well drilling campaign in Kenya and Ethiopia, the Twiga South-1 wildcat Read More

Reservoir monitoring

The transition from technology development to commercialisation is a very critical phase of any technology innovation company. A main shareholder securing this transition as well as giving valuable input for Read More

New Barents Sea survey

One of the hottest areas in north-west Europe at the moment is the Barents Sea, where a number of major discoveries have been made in recent years, including the giant Read More