Oman’s state-owned Petroleum Development Oman (PDO) has announced a string of achievements in the year 2015, at a recently held corporate presentation at the Sultanate’s Ministry of Oil and Gas.
These included the creation of 7,200 employment, training and re-deployment opportunities for Omanis with PDO contractors and the award of contracts worth more than $3.7bn to nationally registered firms, managing director Raoul Restucci highlighted during his presentation.
PDO achieved the majority of its corporate project delivery milestones on or ahead of plan, and all were delivered within the year, with ground-clearing on the landmark Miraah solar energy project, the largest of its type in the world at peak capacity, already complete.
The company is now working to continuously improve its project delivery with a simplification of standards and further collaboration with contractors which will enhance delivery, the use of the Omani supply chain and improve cost effectiveness.
The company has also ramped up its support of domestic small and medium enterprises, including 190 active Local Community Contractors and four Super Local Community Contractors.
The SLCCS now have a total capital worth of $60.25mn and more than 9,400 shareholders drawn from the communities where they operate.
“Despite the recessionary pressures, it has been more important than ever to pursue our In-Country Value (ICV) programme to build a sustainable Omani industrial/private sector base able to compete on the international stage and retain more of the industry’s wealth in the Sultanate,” Restucci said.
The company is currently operating a variety of commercial-scale enhanced oil recovery (EOR) projects that include chemical EOR, miscible gas injection and thermal applications. It will also continue the maturation of more promising and novel EOR technologies through laboratory and field testing.
However, because of the resource-intensive nature and higher cost of tertiary recovery mechanisms, much emphasis has been placed on accelerating conventional oil and gas opportunities instead of additional short-term expansion of EOR projects.
This optimisation is very much enabled by the several development choices we have in our portfolio and means that EOR is now expected to account for approximately 25% of PDO oil production by 2025, as opposed to last year’s projections of 33% by 2023.
On the safety front, the company recorded a 14% improvement in Lost Time Injury Frequency at 0.28 per million man hours, albeit with two work-related fatalities. There was also a 54% fall in Tier-1 Asset Integrity-Process Safety (AI-PS) incidents and a 30% drop in the overall number of motor vehicle incidents.
“Although we are pleased to see an improved safety performance, there is still much work to do if we are to achieve our Goal Zero aspiration of no harm to people, environment or assets,” Restucci said.
“To further embed the safety culture in PDO, we will place more emphasis on visible leadership and compliance, intervention and respect, supported by improved reporting and simpler, more pervasive training,” he added.
“The creation of employment and training opportunities for Omanis remains a strategic priority for PDO and we are determined to play our part in helping the thousands of nationals who come onto the job market each year to find meaningful and rewarding work.”
Project Prism, PDO’s industry-first initiative into the welfare of more than 30,000 contractor personnel has been stepped up with the aim of confidentially interviewing workers from 200 companies this year about a wide range of topics including safety, pay, training, medical care, food, accommodation and human resources provision in the field.
In 2015, PDO stayed true to its aspirations to be a good corporate citizen, pledging financial support to a range of community and educational initiatives, including school building and further training and marketing support for the Banat Oman social enterprise.
This has now trained more than 300 women from low-income backgrounds in a variety of handicrafts, giving them the opportunity to make a better living.
