OGA leads Southern North Sea hackathon

OGA brought operators and the supply chain together to uncover cost efficiencies and innovative technological solutions applicable to the SNS well plug and abandonment (P&A) market.

As oil and gas fields approach their end of life, plugging and abandoning a well is a necessary step in the majority of decommissioning campaigns to permanently prevent the migration of remaining hydrocarbons to the surface.

Bill Cattanach, OGA Head of Supply Chain, said: “Well P&A costs account for approximately 60% of the overall cost of decommissioning the SNS so a smarter way of working could unlock tens of billions of pounds worth of business opportunities for the local supply chain and cost savings for operators and government.

“This innovative event is a first of its kind for the OGA. We recognise many of the bright ideas and technological solutions lie within the supply chain and the hackathon acts as a platform to present these directly to influential operators and collaborate on challenges being faced by all those in the SNS basin. Lessons learned here can be applied elsewhere to establish a highly competitive and capable new decommissioning sector for the whole UKCS.”

The hackathon concept was originally developed by the computer programming industry and has since been adopted by other sectors. Last year’s project hackthon held by Centrica received an inaugural OGA Maximising Economic Recovery (MER) UK Award.

The OGA is hosting a second SNS well P&A hackathon in Norwich on Wednesday 29th June at Norwich City Football Club. For more information on attending this event, please contact: sylvia.buchan@ogauthority.co.uk

ENDS

For more information please contact:

Leona Minellas

Email: leona.minellas@nstauthority