New technology center to enhance exploitation of North Sea oil and gas
ABERDEEN -- Today, Lord Dunlop, UK Government Minister for Scotland and Paul Wheelhouse MSP, Scottish Government Minister for Business, Innovation and Energy opened the new £180-million Oil & Gas Technology Center in Aberdeen.
They joined leaders from industry, universities and local councils at the launch event to hear how the Center – a core part of the £250-million Aberdeen City Region Deal – aims to become the go-to center for oil and gas technology in the UK and internationally.
Keynote speaker, Ian Constance, chief executive of the Advanced Propulsion Center, delivered an inspirational speech describing how the UK automotive industry has embraced technology and innovation to reinvent itself over the past decade.
In a further announcement, The Oil & Gas Technology Center, The University of Aberdeen and Robert Gordon University signed a memorandum of understanding for a multi-million pound joint venture to develop a Center of Excellence for field life extension and decommissioning in Aberdeen.
This groundbreaking partnership will drive the technology innovation needed to maximize economic recovery, make sure that facilities are decommissioned efficiently and help the UK become a global leader in this growth market.
The Oil & Gas Technology Center will help to unlock the full potential of the UK North Sea, anchor the high-value supply chain in the North-East of Scotland and make the region a great place to live, work and invest for decades to come.
The Center will work with a wide range of partners to accelerate the development and deployment of technologies that improve efficiency and increase productivity, creating a global technology hub that benefits the industry and the region.
It will co-invest alongside industry, technology and academic partners, whose matched funding contribution can be both in cash and in-kind in the form of access to knowledge, expertise, assets, facilities and equipment.
The Oil & Gas Technology Center will learn from the experience of other sectors, exploring how exciting technologies such as 3D printing, photonics, virtual reality and robotics can be used to help maximize the economic recovery of UK offshore oil and gas.
Initial projects will help to halve the cost of drilling wells, reduce maintenance costs by up to 50%, and unlock up to 3 Bbbl of oil currently stranded in small discoveries' marginal fields. Digital and decommissioning are also important early themes.
The Center has already screened hundreds of opportunities and many projects are underway. These include a field trial in 2017, which could create a step change in how wells are plugged and abandoned with the potential to save hundreds of millions of pounds.
