Challenging Times in Oil, Gas & Petrochemicals: Operational Excellence as a Key Solution

Euro Petroleum Consultants [EPC], the leading international consulting company, has announced the programme for the third edition of OpEx MENA 2015 – Operational Excellence in Oil, Gas & Petrochemicals Conference. The annual forum, which takes place in Abu Dhabi from 6 - 8 December, has proved to be a highly valuable and informative event to keep up-to-date with best practices in what most players consider to be an essential part of modern business in oil, gas and petrochemicals. Companies confirmed to participate include Takreer, Sabic, Sadara Chemical Company, BAPCO, Petro Rabigh, Equate, S-Chem, PIC, DuPont, Schneider Electric, AVEVA and many more.

Last year’s OpEx MENA event was attended by a large number of end-users and Andy Gibbins, EPC Vice President MENA, explains why operational excellence programmes are vital for producer companies to adopt, “Given the falls in crude oil and natural gas prices, many producers are under significant and immediate pressure to reduce expenditure but it is essential that this is done in a way that does not impact the long term safety, reliability, flexibility and efficiency of the organisation. Companies need to be smart during times of economic instability and cost cutting, without careful consideration, can be a recipe for disaster. Solutions and case studies will be discussed in detail during the three day forum.”

A company spokesperson for DuPont Sustainable Solutions, a major sponsor of the event, adds their view “that current economic conditions are forcing Operational Excellence initiatives to look for ways to reduce cost whilst staying competitive. Companies need to be able to use the current situation as an opportunity to outperform competition. The only answer to volatility is agility.”

‘People and how to achieve organisational excellence’ is one of the conference topics that the organisers believe is key and Luc Geerts, Senior Consulting Solutions Director for Schneider Electric agrees: “people are fundamental to Operational Excellence. In a climate where investments are limited, budgets related to advanced software solutions can help producer companies to reduce operating costs, generating improved yields and efficiencies.”

‘How to maximise reliability, whilst minimising operating costs’ is another important conference theme and Aveva, the leading engineering software provider, will give an insight into how organisations can have safe, reliable and efficient operations. Derek Middlemas, COO & Head of Enterprise Solutions at Aveva was asked what piece of golden advice he would give producers on Operational Excellence and he answered, “Know your assets! Without accurate, complete and detailed knowledge of the true current state of an in-service asset, Operational Excellence is built on sand. Fortunately Aveva’s Digital Asset Strategy now makes the capture, validation and integration of asset information a practical and affordable proposition.”

OpEx MENA 2015, the’ must attend’ industry forum for Operational Excellence, will begin on 6 December with a pre-conference seminar presented by DuPont on Extracting Maximum Value from Assets and Operations. The forum, which has been designed to reflect the current business conditions, will continue over the following two days with the organisers confident that attendees to the conference will learn many lessons about how to deal with situations that organisations are currently facing.

For more information about the conference, please visit www.opex.biz or contact the organiser directly at office@europetro-me.com