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September 24th, 2010:

Shell May Seek to Develop Unconventional Gas Fields in Russia

Bloomberg

By Stephen Bierman – Sep 24, 2010

Royal Dutch Shell Plc may seek to develop coal-bed methane in Siberian Russia after a meeting with regional officials.

“The Kemerovo region is Russia’s leading coal province and may be of interest for Shell given our expertise and advanced technologies in coal-bed methane,” Vera Surzhenko, a spokeswoman for Shell, said by telephone from Moscow today. “At the moment it is too early to say anything specifically.”

Russia, holder of the largest natural-gas reserves, may have as much as 87 trillion cubic meters of coal-bed methane, OAO Gazprom Chief Executive Officer Alexei Miller said in February. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev at the time said this was the equivalent of two OAO Gazproms. read more

This website and sisters royaldutchshellplc.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, and shellnews.net, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.

Shell’s antiquated Arctic drilling fleet

When you consider what Shell is proposing to use in the harsh Arctic environment to drill its exploration wells (the refurbished but antiquated Frontier Discoverer, with the obsolete and beat-up Kulluk as a backup rig), one wonders whether Shell USA management truly understands the nature of the environment they are going to be operating in.

From a former employee of Shell Oil USA

Attached is a link to an article about the ODECO Ocean Ranger (right), a large modern semi-submersible rig that sank during a storm. It was drilling a well for Mobil (now ExxonMobil) in the Hibernia oil field, offshore Nova Scotia, Canada.

(Ocean Ranger vanishes off Canada)

This case is interesting because there are parallels with the problems BP had with its production platform ‘Thunder Horse’, which almost sank in a hurricane that is was supposedly designed to withstand.

‘A design flaw (porthole too low) and poor worker training were the cause of the sinking of the Ocean Ranger. Poor worker training was essentially the cause of the Deep Water Horizon disaster. And a design flaw, a valve installed backwards, almost sank BP’s Thunder Horse production platform in the hurricane. All three incidents/accidents were avoidable if oil company and rig company management had been doing their jobs.’

Did I ever mention
‘Murphy’s Law’ to you? read more

This website and sisters royaldutchshellplc.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, and shellnews.net, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.

Shining a harsh light into the murky world of corporate behaviour

“I suppose Cable’s experience of this murky world came while enjoying his comfortable existence as a well paid employee of Shell.”

Comment from the Daily Telegraph article: Emotional Anti-Business Secretary should be an odd man out of a job

This website and sisters royaldutchshellplc.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, and shellnews.net, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.