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By Hector Igbikiowubo
Posted to the Web: Tuesday, February 15, 2005
SHELL Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) has relocated its exploration unit based in Houston, USA to Nigeria in demonstration of its commitment to the development of local content in the country.
The company disclosed that the move is expected to consolidate deepwater exploration expertise which was previously scattered in four locations around the world including Houston, Rijswijk, Lagos and Port Harcourt, and create a centre of excellence in Lagos.
A recent edition of the Shell Bulletin, an in-house journal of the company disclosed that in early 2000 Mr. Emmanuel Enu, the company’s Deepwater Exploration Manager had mid-wived the establishment of the Niger Delta deepwater team in Houston, adding that this followed the formation of the Shell Deepwater Services by the Shell Group as a centre of excellence.
It is expected that teams from all deepwater basins across the Group would come together from time to time to share experiences.
The Shell group realised that deepwater was largely uncharted territory with few experts, which is why the need to bring the teams together in an arrangement that combines synergy became imperative.
The company disclosed that the strategy employed offered the Group visible advantages like faster work completion rate, top end infrastructure, and the opportunity for deepwater experts from various Shell Operating Units to share ideas and best practices.
"If you are working on a project and encounter a problem, you don’t have to call some-one in Malaysia or the Gulf of Mexico. The people with the expertise are there , and it would merely require walking from one team to another and saying I am working on this and have encountered this sort of problem, Can someone help?" Mr. Enu disclosed.
Mr. Enu disclosed that he had tried to broaden the skills of those who went with him to Houston while doing some portfolio work which enabled the company to apply for and acquireadditional deepwater blocks.
"I tried to develop the Nigerians who went with me by encouraging them to work in other teams like the Brazilian team, so that by the time they come back, they would have acquired both exploration and development knowledge," he said.
It was gathered that during the five years the team was in Houston, they made several discoveries which include Bonga South West and Bolia in OPL 219, while playing a pivotal role in discoveries made by other Nigerian operators.
While speaking on the development, Mr. Martijn Minderhound, the company’s Regional Exploration Director disclosed that Nigeria is very important for the Group given its significant exploration resources.
"As the new Global Exploration Unit demonstrated early successes, we decided to further encourage the exploration effort here. The drive was to refocus exploration activities in a systematic manner, by drawing on the pool of Nigerian exploration expertise from other locations back to Nigeria," he disclosed.
The Bulletin also disclosed that under its new setting, the company will draw on expertise from within the Group and look at exploration opportunities throughout Nigeria as a single portfolio.
While speaking on the new setting also, Mr. Angus McCoss, the Nigeria Area Exploration Manager disclosed that Mr. Enu would be leading evaluation teams from Lagos to deliver Cat’ wells. "It is a significant change. In the past this was largely done from Houston. Going forward, we are going to be doing most of that from Lagos," he pointed out. | 
