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Posting ID: 3681965340Posted: 2013-03-14, 7:14PM PDTEdited: 2013-03-14, 7:14PM PDTemail to a friendSorry, I could not read the content fromt this page.
Monday, August 26, 2013
A preview of Houston’s bid for the 2017 World Petroleum Congress
Tours of busy drilling sites in the Eagle Ford Shale will be part of the package Houston is offering in its bid for the 2017 World Petroleum Congress. (Jerry Lara/San Antonio Express-News)Even in a city where energy conferences are held almost every week, one event has eluded Houston’s grasp for decades. But the city is in the running to host the World Petroleum Congress in 2017.
The event is organized by the London-based World Petroleum Council, made up of 65 member countries, which describes the meeting as the Olympics of the oil and gas industry.
J. Gerardo Uria, director of general membership for the American Petroleum Institute, earlier this month identified the other contenders as Instanbul, Turkey; Copenhagen, Denmark, and Astana, Kazakhstan.
Member countries will vote during an October meeting in Calgary, Alberta, said Galen Cobb, chairman of the U.S. national committee for the World Petroleum Council.
He said Houston can offer things no other city can, including tours of the city’s energy companies and the nearby South Texas shale fields and online, real-time access for people who aren’t able to attend.
The World Petroleum Congress is held every three years, a gathering of thousands of top-level executives of international oil companies, national oil companies and service companies. Houston also bid for the 2014 meeting, losing out to Moscow by just a few votes.
Houston last hosted the event in 1987, also the last time the gathering was in the U.S.
Jorge Franz, vice president of tourism and international group sales for the Greater Houston Convention and Visitors Bureau, said the agency decided four years ago to pursue international meetings more actively. At the direction of Mayor Annise Parker, the effort focused on the city’s key business sectors: energy, medicine and aerospace.
The Congress typically draws 5,000 to 10,000 delegates, although Franz said attendance could climb to 12,000 in Houston.
Parker helped present Houston’s bid for the 2014 event, pitting Houston against Moscow and Bogota, Colombia.
“We learned a lot,” Franz said.
The World Petroleum Council, which says its member countries produce and consume 95 percent of the world’s energy, describes its triennial meeting as the Olympics of oil and gas because of the scale of the event. But Franz said the decision-making for the host city is like the Olympics, too.
“It’s an electronic vote,” he said. “You literally sit in front of all the countries that attend the vote. You make your pitch, and they have a live vote. It’s a secret vote, but you see who gets what, and you know right away.”
Each city submitting a bid has to have the support of the chairman of the national committee, and Cobb, vice president for industry relations at Halliburton, said Houston’s bid really is a U.S. national committee bid.
The Congress met in Doha, Qatar, in 2011. Cobb said after the 2014 meeting in Moscow, there may be interest in moving it to the Western Hemisphere; that, coupled with international focus on the North American shale plays and western technology, should give Houston’s bid a boost.
“We see it every day with visits from international countries, national oil companies coming to learn about how we’re doing it in the United States,” he said. “The shale plays, they’re all over the world.
As we develop those here, it’ll definitely develop into resource plays all over the world.”
“It’ll also have huge geopolitical repercussions,” he said. “What does it mean for OPEC? What does it mean for U.S. national security? All of these are game-changers.”
But Houston has some other things going for it, too, Cobb said, including new hotel developments downtown. The city’s bid calls for the conference to be held at the George R. Brown Convention Center across from Discovery Green, an area where developers have announced several new hotel projects.
That will take traffic problems out of the equation, Cobb said, allowing Houston to offer 6,000 to 9,000 hotel rooms within walking distance of the conference.
The city’s 2014 bid drew concerns that international delegates would have problems getting visas, but Cobb said the team has been assured the issue has been addressed.
“No one can guarantee everyone in any country can get a visa, but if you meet the requirements, you should be able to come,” he said.
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Posted: 2013-03-14, 7:15PM PDTEdited: 2013-03-14, 7:20PM PDTemail to a friendHouse moves to expand offshore drilling
BP's Thunder Horse semi-submersible facility in the Gulf of Mexico, about 150 miles southeast of New Orleans. (Photo courtesy BP)The House on Friday passed legislation that would expand offshore drilling by forcing the federal government to sell new oil and gas leases along the coasts of California, South Carolina, Virginia and any other states where governors say they want the work.
But the measure, which passed on a mostly party-line vote of 235-186, is not expected to advance in the Democrat-controlled Senate, much less clear the chamber with enough support to overturn a threatened veto by President Barack Obama.
Beyond targeting California, South Carolina and Virginia for offshore oil drilling, the bill would limit environmental reviews of the mandated lease sales, forcing federal regulators to study the implications of oil exploration in all three areas simultaneously, rather than with separate, area-specific studies.
At the same time, it would force the Interior Department to focus all future oil and gas leasing plans to areas with the most potential. Regulators would have to sell leases in areas estimated to contain more than 2.5 billion barrels of oil or more than 7.5 trillion cubic feet of natural gas — or if the adjacent state governor asks for the auction.
The measure also would slowly phase in a program for coastal states to collect a share of federal revenues tied to offshore oil and gas development. Although far less aggressive than the leading Senate revenue-sharing proposal, the House measure is opposed by offshore drilling foes who say it could lure even skeptical state leaders to support coastal oil exploration as a way to raise money.
By a vote of 238-185, the House adopted an amendment by Rep. Bill Cassidy, D-La., that would give Gulf Coast states a chance to score even more money from nearby drilling, by boosting a $500 million cap on the amount they can collect under a revenue-sharing program set to begin in 2017. Cassidy’s amendment set the annual threshold at $999 million.
Related story: Louisiana senator makes pitch for drilling dollars
Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., who sponsored the underlying bill, said it would put the U.S. “back on the right path,” by creating 1.2 million American jobs, lowering energy prices and generating an estimated $1.5 billion in new revenue to the federal government.
But critics said the legislation would radically and irresponsibly expand offshore drilling, while short-circuiting environmental reviews of the work and before Congress makes some major changes called for in the wake of the 2010 Gulf oil spill.
“The bill . . . would allow Big Oil to put drilling rigs off the Atlantic, Pacific and Alaskan coasts without enacting key drilling safety reforms that we know should be there following the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster,” said Rep. Rush Holt, D-N.J.
Rep. Bill Pascrell, D-N.J., said the “bill would completely rewrite the administration’s plan for offshore leasing in a reckless and irresponsible manner.”
The Interior Department took steps administratively to boost offshore drilling safety after the Gulf spill, including a sweeping reorganization of the agency that oversaw coastal oil and gas development. Regulators also began requiring companies to prove they can rein in a subsea blowout before getting approval to drill deep-water wells, imposed new well design standards and set new testing requirements for essential emergency equipment.
Hastings’ bill would largely codify the reorganization of agencies that oversee offshore drilling, but it does not include a plan to hike oil spill liability for companies working on the outer continental shelf.
One of the last acts before lawmakers head home for a week-long July 4 recess, passage of the bill gives political ammunition to Republicans as motorists hit the highway — and fuel up at filling stations — for summer vacations.
More domestic oil and gas development means lower fuel prices, Republicans said on the House floor.
Rep. Jeff Duncan, R-S.C., stressed wider economic benefits of expanded drilling, well beyond the Gulf Coast.
“The first domino is the jobs that are created on the offshore rigs,” he said. “But if you ride on Highway 90 from Lafayette, La., down toward New Iberia and Houma, La., you’re going to see on both sides of the road, business after business after business that is supporting the offshore industries.”
“This is a true job creator,” he added.
Democrats cast the bill as nothing more than a political messaging measure that faces certain death in the Senate.
Rep. Alan Lowenthal, D-Calif., called the legislation “a messy conglomeration of retread ideas that wastes this chamber’s time,” since portions of the bill “have been rejected by the Senate, by many of the affected states, and have a zero chance of being signed by the president.”
Rep. Gene Green, D-Houston, acknowledged the bill was meant to send a message _ but said that’s exactly why he was backing the legislation, despite some concerns.
“While I do not agree with some of the environmental provisions in this bill, I support it because it is a message bill about the importance of accessing our offshore resources,” Green said. “With the president reneging on certain areas originally contained in his 2012-2017 five-year offshore leasing plan, our future access over the next decade is extremely limited. We need to open new offshore areas up for production instead of producing on the same lands we have for decades.”
The Interior Department’s current five-year plan, which lays out the schedule for offshore lease sales through June 30, 2017, includes a dozen auctions of territory in the Gulf of Mexico and three of tracts near Alaska. But regulators at the Interior Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management opted not to plan an auction of leases near Virginia, where a sale had previously been scheduled (and canceled after the 2010 Gulf spill). Some Alaskan areas and southern California acreage, near existing development, also were left out of the plan.
Republicans turned back a bid by Democratic Rep. Lois Capps to strip out the bill provisions requiring a sale of offshore oil and gas leases near her home state of California. By a vote of 235-183, the House also rejected an amendment offered by Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., that would have blocked future oil and gas development in Alaska’s Bristol Bay.
Tooling Engineer - McCoy Drilling & Completions | Rig Parts - Lafayette, LA
• Establish a “set up time” reduction initiative utilizing SMED principles
• Co-ordinate and run training sessions
• Assist Engineering Department to ensure part designs are optimized for production as needed
• Detail review of part Geometry prior to work order or tooling release
• Play a key role in selecting suitable manufacturing processes
• Trouble shooting at work cells while the tooling is in use to assist Machinist
• Develop & Implement production capability, evaluate prototypes and feedback improvements
• Co-ordinate and run training sessions
• Assist Engineering Department to ensure part designs are optimized for production as needed
• Detail review of part Geometry prior to work order or tooling release
• Play a key role in selecting suitable manufacturing processes
• Trouble shooting at work cells while the tooling is in use to assist Machinist
• Develop & Implement production capability, evaluate prototypes and feedback improvements
Qualifications:
• Bachelor Degree in Mechanical Engineering
• Machine shop experience, ideally with Mazak and Haas equipment
• Proven ability of developing parts and tooling
• Technical and Interpersonal competencies
• Proven ability in conducting Design of Experiment tests and analyzing the results
• Ability to read, analyze and interpret complex engineering documentation
• Understanding of Geometric Dimensioning & Tolerance
• Able to effectively communicate with managers, peers, suppliers, and customers
• Proficient computer skills including CAD/CAM, Word, Excel, and Outlook
We offer competitive wages and a comprehensive benefit package, plus a great environment to work in.
McCoy - 3 hours ago - save job - block Manufacturing Engineer
McCoy Drilling & Completions | Superior Manufacturing & Hydraulics - Broussard, LA
McCoy - 10 days ago
Office/Sales Assistant for wholesale distributor (La Verne, CA)
Skill requirements:
*** 1 year minimum experience is a MUST***
***With legal working status***
Excellent in EXCEL (spreadsheets and formulas) and WORD.
Graphic Design is a plus!
Strong analytical and internet research skills
Capability to handle multiple priorities in a diverse work environment.
Duties & Responsibilities (included but not limited to the following):
Answer calls
New products data entry.
Taking products photo.
Please email resume to by clicking above address.
Posting ID: 3681959994
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