“Wow!”, exclaimed Kelly, the site supervisor at the large petrochemical plant. “Are you telling me that I can take my iPhone onto the site? It’s safe now? What can I do with it?" Yes, Kelly, you can, IF you have the right phone AND the right case. As they are in our personal lives, smart phones are indispensable Swiss Army Knives of digital utility, and they will be highly welcome on oil and gas sites, petrochemical plants, and many other industrial sites besides. As Kelly well knows, today’s intrinsically unsafe device holds the record for the longest running streak as the number one controllable site safety risk for the past ten years because it induces inattentiveness for the user, enables unauthorized site surveillance, and triggers (maybe) the next front page news refinery explosion. But tomorrow, your smart phone will be viewed as the single most important safety enabler on the site, beating out hand rails on stairs, emergency wash stations, light bulbs, and lids on coffee cups. I bet you won’t be allowed on site without on. Here are a handful of the ways that such a phone and case could benefit the front line worker.

“Wow!”, exclaimed Kelly, the site supervisor at the large petrochemical plant. “Are you telling me that I can take my iPhone onto the site? It’s safe now? What can I do with it?" Yes, Kelly, you can, IF you have the right phone AND the right case. As they are in our personal lives, smart phones are indispensable Swiss Army Knives of digital utility, and they will be highly welcome on oil and gas sites, petrochemical plants, and many other industrial sites besides. As Kelly well knows, today’s intrinsically unsafe device holds the record for the longest running streak as the number one controllable site safety risk for the past ten years because it induces inattentiveness for the user, enables unauthorized site surveillance, and triggers (maybe) the next front page news refinery explosion. But tomorrow, your smart phone will be viewed as the single most important safety enabler on the site, beating out hand rails on stairs, emergency wash stations, light bulbs, and lids on coffee cups. I bet you won’t be allowed on site without on. Here are a handful of the ways that such a phone and case could benefit the front line worker.

What if … You Could Take An Apple iPhone On Site?

"The people that design software, are unfortunately often a long ways away from the people that are out in the field using it." In this episode, I’m in conversation with Shaun Syvertsen, the CEO of ConvergentIS. He has built a company around the opportunity to make a widely used technology (SAP) super easy to use–so easy in fact that users don’t need training, or very little. It all stems from the need to improve adoption rates, and it turns out that ease of use, reduction in fear of technology, and empathy, are keys to successful adoption. There’s much scope in the SAP landscape for such an idea because enterprise technology needs to appeal to a very large, multi-industry market, leaving very niche areas underserved.  "When you make it so easy that you have a group of people that can just go and follow the steps, and they know they're going to get it right, and you're guiding them to get it right, then nobody's scared to go do it." Shaun Syvertsen is the  Managing Partner and CEO of ConvergentIS. He has more than 20 years of experience leading, advising, and delivering successful programs, projects, and initiatives for various companies in the oil and gas, financial, public sector, transportation/logistics, automotive, manufacturing, and IT industries in Canada, the US, and Germany. "Our target state is you actually can't tell the difference between our solution and what SAP built. You install it inside SAP, you don't have to figure out how to integrate it." USEFUL LINKS   LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):     Personal: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shaunsyv/   Business: https://www.linkedin.com/company/convergentis/    Website:     https://www.convergentis.com/   

"The people that design software, are unfortunately often a long ways away from the people that are out in the field using it." In this episode, I’m in conversation with Shaun Syvertsen, the CEO of ConvergentIS. He has built a company around the opportunity to make a widely used technology (SAP) super easy to use–so easy in fact that users don’t need training, or very little. It all stems from the need to improve adoption rates, and it turns out that ease of use, reduction in fear of technology, and empathy, are keys to successful adoption. There’s much scope in the SAP landscape for such an idea because enterprise technology needs to appeal to a very large, multi-industry market, leaving very niche areas underserved.  "When you make it so easy that you have a group of people that can just go and follow the steps, and they know they're going to get it right, and you're guiding them to get it right, then nobody's scared to go do it." Shaun Syvertsen is the  Managing Partner and CEO of ConvergentIS. He has more than 20 years of experience leading, advising, and delivering successful programs, projects, and initiatives for various companies in the oil and gas, financial, public sector, transportation/logistics, automotive, manufacturing, and IT industries in Canada, the US, and Germany. "Our target state is you actually can't tell the difference between our solution and what SAP built. You install it inside SAP, you don't have to figure out how to integrate it." USEFUL LINKS <ul> <li> LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):  </li> <ul> <li> Personal: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/shaunsyv/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/in/shaunsyv/</a> </li> <li> Business: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/convergentis/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/company/convergentis/</a> </li> </ul> <li> Website:  </li> <ul> <li> <a href="https://www.convergentis.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.convergentis.com/</a> </li> </ul> </ul>

Shaun Syvertsen on Unlocking Potential through Better Adoption

As far back as 2004, I explored the possibility of deploying cellular phones within an oil refining complex. The idea of persistent and safe communications with supervisors and lead hands by phone or text message during the work day was intuitively attractive, and we imagineered many a positive use case. This was in the era of the BlackBerry mobile phone, long before Apple created the smart phone category. However, we ultimately abandoned the concept. A decade later in 2014, I was reminded how far consumer technology has progressed when I was contacted by a young Australian field engineer with a creative mobile worker solution. The young engineer’s solution had cost all of $500.  He had taken a risk by using a consumer-grade tablet, but the gas assets were all outdoors, and the risk of a conflagration minimal. He also took a lot of grief back in the home office for disrupting the normal work routine, and was told to cease and desist his innovation. Fast forward yet another decade, to 2023, and Suncor has rolled out the new cases and handsets to thousands of front line workers, and the use cases that I had imagined 20 years ago are finally being realized.

As far back as 2004, I explored the possibility of deploying cellular phones within an oil refining complex. The idea of persistent and safe communications with supervisors and lead hands by phone or text message during the work day was intuitively attractive, and we imagineered many a positive use case. This was in the era of the BlackBerry mobile phone, long before Apple created the smart phone category. However, we ultimately abandoned the concept. A decade later in 2014, I was reminded how far consumer technology has progressed when I was contacted by a young Australian field engineer with a creative mobile worker solution. The young engineer’s solution had cost all of $500.  He had taken a risk by using a consumer-grade tablet, but the gas assets were all outdoors, and the risk of a conflagration minimal. He also took a lot of grief back in the home office for disrupting the normal work routine, and was told to cease and desist his innovation. Fast forward yet another decade, to 2023, and Suncor has rolled out the new cases and handsets to thousands of front line workers, and the use cases that I had imagined 20 years ago are finally being realized.

Apple iPhones Now Permitted on Oil and Gas Sites

Heavy industry has long known that intoxication and some kinds of work simply don’t mix. Digital technologies are helping overcome the risk of hard-to-detect intoxicants on the job site. Worker safety is a VERY BIG DEAL in oil and gas. Moving equipment, pressurized vessels, high voltage, dangerous gases, hot surfaces, sharp objects, dark and wet conditions, drops from height, slippery surfaces, falling objects… the risks in the industrial workplace are manifestly greater. Employees need to have their wits about them at all times. Relative to other substance challenges, alcohol is easier for employers to manage. Other impairing substances, such as cannabis, are much more difficult to pick up. Cannabis doesn’t behave like alcohol in the body. It binds to fat cells, and is detectable for weeks, well after the intoxication effect has vanished, whereas alcohol washes out of your system relatively quickly. Unlike alcohol, the amount of cannabis you consume, and the resulting level of THC in your body, is not correlated to your level of impairment. What if we were able to supplement the industry standard law enforcement eye exam, normally administrated by a highly trained professional, but using digital technologies such as a camera, to capture eye behaviour in response to stimuli, and an algorithm that interprets the eye behaviour?

Heavy industry has long known that intoxication and some kinds of work simply don’t mix. Digital technologies are helping overcome the risk of hard-to-detect intoxicants on the job site. Worker safety is a VERY BIG DEAL in oil and gas. Moving equipment, pressurized vessels, high voltage, dangerous gases, hot surfaces, sharp objects, dark and wet conditions, drops from height, slippery surfaces, falling objects… the risks in the industrial workplace are manifestly greater. Employees need to have their wits about them at all times. Relative to other substance challenges, alcohol is easier for employers to manage. Other impairing substances, such as cannabis, are much more difficult to pick up. Cannabis doesn’t behave like alcohol in the body. It binds to fat cells, and is detectable for weeks, well after the intoxication effect has vanished, whereas alcohol washes out of your system relatively quickly. Unlike alcohol, the amount of cannabis you consume, and the resulting level of THC in your body, is not correlated to your level of impairment. What if we were able to supplement the industry standard law enforcement eye exam, normally administrated by a highly trained professional, but using digital technologies such as a camera, to capture eye behaviour in response to stimuli, and an algorithm that interprets the eye behaviour?

Legal Drugs In The Workplace — What Could Go Wrong

A quick trial of ChatGPT reveals its considerable strengths and its worrisome weaknesses in generating energy talking points. One of my many contacts asked me a rather simple question earlier this week: Why does Greenpeace not like LNG? My contact is from Germany, and presumably has lots of family members and friends there who have been living through Germany’s recent natural gas energy angst. As a thought experiment I wondered how a modern digital solution like ChatGPT might answer the same question, so I asked it the same question. ChatGPT did not disappoint, but neither did it impress. I would be cautious relying on ChatGPT to help with understanding the complex world of energy security. This little episode is a fine illustration of the perils of this kind of technology at this early stage of its life:   ChatGPT’s grasp of the technical facts around LNG, a 60 year old technology, is weak. That does not bode well for its understanding of more modern and complicated technologies.   ChatGPT’s responses are quickly generated, which is value, but we need to be very sure we are asking the right questions, and we take the time to quiz the responses to see if interesting and relevant contradictory information is being unintentionally withheld.   Many in society lack the patience, the skepticism, and the inquiry skills to push back on the narratives produced by generative AI. Fortunately, that’s not the oil and gas industry. We’re a skeptical bunch.  

A quick trial of ChatGPT reveals its considerable strengths and its worrisome weaknesses in generating energy talking points. One of my many contacts asked me a rather simple question earlier this week: Why does Greenpeace not like LNG? My contact is from Germany, and presumably has lots of family members and friends there who have been living through Germany’s recent natural gas energy angst. As a thought experiment I wondered how a modern digital solution like ChatGPT might answer the same question, so I asked it the same question. ChatGPT did not disappoint, but neither did it impress. I would be cautious relying on ChatGPT to help with understanding the complex world of energy security. This little episode is a fine illustration of the perils of this kind of technology at this early stage of its life: <ul> <li> ChatGPT’s grasp of the technical facts around LNG, a 60 year old technology, is weak. That does not bode well for its understanding of more modern and complicated technologies. </li> <li> ChatGPT’s responses are quickly generated, which is value, but we need to be very sure we are asking the right questions, and we take the time to quiz the responses to see if interesting and relevant contradictory information is being unintentionally withheld. </li> <li> Many in society lack the patience, the skepticism, and the inquiry skills to push back on the narratives produced by generative AI. Fortunately, that’s not the oil and gas industry. We’re a skeptical bunch. </li> </ul>

Learning to Live with (de)Generative AI

"Hydraulic fracture is not just about breaking new rock, it's about fundamentally rejuvenating the existing natural fractures and bedding planes that are in the rock fabric itself." In this episode, I’m in conversation with Andrew McMurray, the CEO and Co-Founder of ShearFrac. Andrew and his team are using cloud capabilities from AWS to deliver complex calculations to frack teams that improve the performance of frack jobs (lowering the cost of fracturing operations and improving the yields). Interestingly, by giving frack teams a new actionable KPI that is geared to outputs (yield) and not solely inputs (water and sand pumped), performance improves.  "Anything that you can do in real time to respond in real time is going to add more value than if you make a bunch of decisions, look back at them and realize they were the wrong decisions." Andrew is a Mechanical Engineer with a passion for responsible hydrocarbon recovery and technology development. Throughout his career, Andrew has been successful in developing and executing disruptive completion technologies in the industry as an operator with Shell or as part of a service company, STEP. Before Co-Founding Shear FRAC Group, LLC, Andrew was the General Manager of Canada for Darcy Partners, focused on identifying, developing, and accelerating innovative technology across multiple petroleum verticals. "I'm so proud to be a Canadian engineer, because on a global basis, we're very respected for our understanding of the subsurface and our ability to do things environmentally friendly and responsibly." USEFUL LINKS   LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):     Personal: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-mcmurray-78b4521b/   Business: https://www.linkedin.com/company/28831831    YouTube    https://www.youtube.com/@shearfrac2019    Website:      https://shearfrac.com/   

"Hydraulic fracture is not just about breaking new rock, it's about fundamentally rejuvenating the existing natural fractures and bedding planes that are in the rock fabric itself." In this episode, I’m in conversation with <a href="mailto:a.mcmurray@shearfrac.com">Andrew McMurray</a>, the CEO and Co-Founder of ShearFrac. Andrew and his team are using cloud capabilities from AWS to deliver complex calculations to frack teams that improve the performance of frack jobs (lowering the cost of fracturing operations and improving the yields). Interestingly, by giving frack teams a new actionable KPI that is geared to outputs (yield) and not solely inputs (water and sand pumped), performance improves.  "Anything that you can do in real time to respond in real time is going to add more value than if you make a bunch of decisions, look back at them and realize they were the wrong decisions." Andrew is a Mechanical Engineer with a passion for responsible hydrocarbon recovery and technology development. Throughout his career, Andrew has been successful in developing and executing disruptive completion technologies in the industry as an operator with Shell or as part of a service company, STEP. Before Co-Founding Shear FRAC Group, LLC, Andrew was the General Manager of Canada for Darcy Partners, focused on identifying, developing, and accelerating innovative technology across multiple petroleum verticals. "I'm so proud to be a Canadian engineer, because on a global basis, we're very respected for our understanding of the subsurface and our ability to do things environmentally friendly and responsibly." USEFUL LINKS <ul> <li> LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):  </li> <ul> <li> Personal: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-mcmurray-78b4521b/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-mcmurray-78b4521b/</a> </li> <li> Business: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/28831831/admin/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/company/28831831</a> </li> </ul> <li> YouTube </li> <ul> <li> <a href="https://www.youtube.com/@shearfrac2019" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/@shearfrac2019</a> </li> </ul> <li> Website:  </li> <ul> <li> <a href="https://shearfrac.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://shearfrac.com/</a> </li> </ul> </ul>

Andrew McMurray on Improving Fracking Success Using Digital

I’ve written hundreds of articles and podcast episodes about the liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry, and I’m still learning stuff I didn’t know. At an LNG conference recently, I heard speakers share perspectives on a range of topics that warranted a reminder of the nuances of this fascinating industry. LNG is a wondrous fuel with loads of potential for humanity, but it does have its quirks. The next time you hear some magical story about how LNG will save the world, or some equally gloomy review of its potential to destroy the planet, dust off this podcast for a sense check. Here’s eight things about LNG that you probably didn’t know.

I’ve written hundreds of articles and podcast episodes about the liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry, and I’m still learning stuff I didn’t know. At an LNG conference recently, I heard speakers share perspectives on a range of topics that warranted a reminder of the nuances of this fascinating industry. LNG is a wondrous fuel with loads of potential for humanity, but it does have its quirks. The next time you hear some magical story about how LNG will save the world, or some equally gloomy review of its potential to destroy the planet, dust off this podcast for a sense check. Here’s eight things about LNG that you probably didn’t know.

Eight Things You Didn’t Know About LNG

Mike Procee

In this episode, I’m in conversation with Mike Procee, who at the time of recording was the Manager of Enterprise Innovation, Enablement, and Culture at TC Energy, a large oil and gas utility. Mike’s background in entrepreneurship and engineering came together at TC who wanted to accelerate their ability to deal with energy transition and digitalization. The company created an innovation hub that could provide its business units with facilitation, coaching and guidance to improve its ability to embrace positive change. It’s proof that big energy companies can change their stripes.   "Everyone's heard the stories about Kodak. Everyone's heard the story about BlockBuster. Nobody wants to kind of follow in their footsteps." Here are some of Mike's quotes from the podcast...  "These little collisions, with HR combining with engineering, your marketing team combining with sales, these groups that don't typically work together getting together are seeing these innovative solutions, and then actually driving more value out of them." "The argument can be made that you don't want to define innovation. Sometimes you want to create a very open space to let the horses run free." Today, Mike is the Manager of Project Enablement at TC Energy.  Mike is an experienced Mechanical Engineer with a demonstrated history of working in hydraulic design and leveraging those skills to help facilitate discussion for optimization. He is passionate about innovation and employee experience while exploring their connection to bottom-line impacts. USEFUL LINKS   LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):     Personal: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mike-procee-mba-p-eng-06860478/   Business: https://www.linkedin.com/company/tcenergy/   

In this episode, I’m in conversation with Mike Procee, who at the time of recording was the Manager of Enterprise Innovation, Enablement, and Culture at TC Energy, a large oil and gas utility. Mike’s background in entrepreneurship and engineering came together at TC who wanted to accelerate their ability to deal with energy transition and digitalization. The company created an innovation hub that could provide its business units with facilitation, coaching and guidance to improve its ability to embrace positive change. It’s proof that big energy companies can change their stripes.   "Everyone's heard the stories about Kodak. Everyone's heard the story about BlockBuster. Nobody wants to kind of follow in their footsteps." Here are some of Mike's quotes from the podcast...  "These little collisions, with HR combining with engineering, your marketing team combining with sales, these groups that don't typically work together getting together are seeing these innovative solutions, and then actually driving more value out of them." "The argument can be made that you don't want to define innovation. Sometimes you want to create a very open space to let the horses run free." Today, Mike is the Manager of Project Enablement at TC Energy.  Mike is an experienced Mechanical Engineer with a demonstrated history of working in hydraulic design and leveraging those skills to help facilitate discussion for optimization. He is passionate about innovation and employee experience while exploring their connection to bottom-line impacts. USEFUL LINKS <ul> <li> LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):  </li> <ul> <li> Personal: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/mike-procee-mba-p-eng-06860478/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/in/mike-procee-mba-p-eng-06860478/</a> </li> <li> Business: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/tcenergy/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/company/tcenergy/</a> </li> </ul> </ul>

Mike Procee On Setting Up a Corporate Innovation Capability

A large integrated oil and gas company has invited me to address their global center for data excellence. That such an organizational creation is necessary is both telling for some and enlightening for others. Data has been central to my work on digital innovations in oil and gas from the very beginning because digital innovation is almost always about capturing value from a reliable data asset. My simple digital innovation formula includes data at its very core:   Sensors generate data   Analytics (AI and machine learning tools) interpret the data   Semi-autonomous and fully autonomous devices (robots, drones) carry out real work using that data   Cloud computing is where data lives   Trusted ledger services provide confidence in the data.   In hindsight, it’s rather sensible that a center for data excellence is now part of the organization structure of a big oil and gas player. Without better data acumen, oil and gas companies are like street brawlers showing up for a fist fight only to discover the opponent is equipped with a pistol. We’re seriously outgunned in the fight for talent, the battle for capital investment, and the latest race called energy transition (which has a huge data theme to it). The work culture of oil and gas is the basis for why our industry lags other sectors in how we think about and approach data.

A large integrated oil and gas company has invited me to address their global center for data excellence. That such an organizational creation is necessary is both telling for some and enlightening for others. Data has been central to my work on digital innovations in oil and gas from the very beginning because digital innovation is almost always about capturing value from a reliable data asset. My simple digital innovation formula includes data at its very core: <ol> <li> Sensors generate data </li> <li> Analytics (AI and machine learning tools) interpret the data </li> <li> Semi-autonomous and fully autonomous devices (robots, drones) carry out real work using that data </li> <li> Cloud computing is where data lives </li> <li> Trusted ledger services provide confidence in the data. </li> </ol> In hindsight, it’s rather sensible that a center for data excellence is now part of the organization structure of a big oil and gas player. Without better data acumen, oil and gas companies are like street brawlers showing up for a fist fight only to discover the opponent is equipped with a pistol. We’re seriously outgunned in the fight for talent, the battle for capital investment, and the latest race called energy transition (which has a huge data theme to it). The work culture of oil and gas is the basis for why our industry lags other sectors in how we think about and approach data.

Creating A Data Culture in Oil and Gas

“It's extremely frustrating to have to make decisions on our multibillion dollar assets, with only a piece of paper in your hand, and a radio on the other side of your hip.” In this episode, I’m in conversation with Andrea Hine, who is a Product Owner within the Connected Worker Program at Suncor Energy. Working with Otterbox, Andrea and her team have developed the world’s first iPhone UL safety case, which means workers on industrial sites can now have a consumer-grade phone with them. This is absolutely ground breaking. The connected front line worker has been the hardest problem to solve in industry, but Andrea and team have done it. “We're making really big decisions about worker safety and in keeping our assets running with a piece of paper that may have out of date information. You don't have subject matter experts available to you. it's incredibly frustrating.” Andrea Hine is as a Product Owner within Suncor’s Digital Innovation and Development team.  Andrea leverages her extensive front-line experience and creative mindset to drive technology initiatives. With a decade of field expertise and a fervent dedication to empowering workers, Andrea plays a pivotal role by delivering tools that enhance safety and efficiency. “If you make workers lives easier for them by giving them software and interfaces, and a piece of hardware that's easy to use, and really intuitive, workers will be on board” USEFUL LINKS   LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):     Personal: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrea-hine-45884928/   Business: https://www.linkedin.com/company/suncor    Twitter handles:    @suncor    Facebook pages:     https://www.facebook.com/suncorenergy/    Website:      https://www.otterboxbusiness.com/ccrz__CCPage?pagekey=Industrial   https://www.suncor.com   

“It's extremely frustrating to have to make decisions on our multibillion dollar assets, with only a piece of paper in your hand, and a radio on the other side of your hip.” In this episode, I’m in conversation with Andrea Hine, who is a Product Owner within the Connected Worker Program at Suncor Energy. Working with Otterbox, Andrea and her team have developed the world’s first iPhone UL safety case, which means workers on industrial sites can now have a consumer-grade phone with them. This is absolutely ground breaking. The connected front line worker has been the hardest problem to solve in industry, but Andrea and team have done it. “We're making really big decisions about worker safety and in keeping our assets running with a piece of paper that may have out of date information. You don't have subject matter experts available to you. it's incredibly frustrating.” Andrea Hine is as a Product Owner within Suncor’s Digital Innovation and Development team.  Andrea leverages her extensive front-line experience and creative mindset to drive technology initiatives. With a decade of field expertise and a fervent dedication to empowering workers, Andrea plays a pivotal role by delivering tools that enhance safety and efficiency. “If you make workers lives easier for them by giving them software and interfaces, and a piece of hardware that's easy to use, and really intuitive, workers will be on board” USEFUL LINKS <ul> <li> LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):  </li> <ul> <li> Personal: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrea-hine-45884928/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrea-hine-45884928/</a> </li> <li> Business: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/suncor" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/company/suncor</a> </li> </ul> <li> Twitter handles: </li> <ul> <li> @suncor </li> </ul> <li> Facebook pages: </li> <ul> <li> <a href="https://www.facebook.com/suncorenergy/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.facebook.com/suncorenergy/</a> </li> </ul> <li> Website:  </li> <ul> <li> <a href="https://www.otterboxbusiness.com/ccrz__CCPage?pagekey=Industrial" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.otterboxbusiness.com/ccrz__CCPage?pagekey=Industrial</a> </li> <li> <a href="https://www.suncor.com" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.suncor.com</a> </li> </ul> </ul>

Andrea Hine on The Mobile Worker in Oil and Gas

A weekly podcast on the impacts of digital on the oil and gas industry.

As we work through energy transition, market forces are poised to create asset discontinuities. They are already wreaking havoc with the oil supply chain. Today’s news from the shipping industry brings energy transition into sharp relief.  An industry monitor noted a collapse in the order books for very large crude carriers (VLCCs, ships that carry two million barrels or more of crude oil). You might not think this is a big deal, but if your first name is Greta, you probably think it’s great news. Which gets us to the following problem: if the capacity to move tidal crude oil to market declines by more than the demand for tidal crude oil declines, then we will eventually have a shortage of crude oil carriers. Prices for moving tidal crude to market will have to rise. In addition to the shortfall in capacity from a lack of orders, a number of ships have gone over to the grey market, carrying sanctioned Russian oil products, effectively being withdrawn from general service. Extend this kind of industrial thinking to all the assets in the oil industry value chain and a number of eventualities become quite real.

As we work through energy transition, market forces are poised to create asset discontinuities. They are already wreaking havoc with the oil supply chain. Today’s news from the shipping industry brings energy transition into sharp relief.  An industry monitor noted a <a href="https://www.freightwaves.com/news/how-decarbonization-backfired-tanker-construction-slows-to-trickle" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" target="_blank">collapse in the order books for very large crude carriers</a> (VLCCs, ships that carry two million barrels or more of crude oil). You might not think this is a big deal, but if your first name is Greta, you probably think it’s great news. Which gets us to the following problem: if the capacity to move tidal crude oil to market declines by more than the demand for tidal crude oil declines, then we will eventually have a shortage of crude oil carriers. Prices for moving tidal crude to market will have to rise. In addition to the shortfall in capacity from a lack of orders, a number of ships have gone over to the grey market, carrying sanctioned Russian oil products, effectively being withdrawn from general service. Extend this kind of industrial thinking to all the assets in the oil industry value chain and a number of eventualities become quite real.

Energy Transition Already Killing Off Long Life Assets

A banking collapse was not likely on the long list of worries that plague the digital entrepreneur. What are the kinds of risks that digital startups face in oil and gas? March 15 stands in infamy as the day that Julius Caesar was stabbed to death at a meeting of the Roman Senate. The conspirators, led by Brutus and Cassius, were ratted out by a seer, who ominously warned Caesar that harm would come to him that day, advice that Caesar pointedly ignored because:  he was arrogant, popular and successful—precisely why the Senators chose to off him, and the seer was not unhelpful in clarifying exactly when the harm would come, where in Rome, and what form the harm might take.  With hindsight, ‘Beware the Ides’ was sound advice from the seer, who apparently derived his insights by consulting the entrails of recently deceased animals. I too have ‘gut instincts’, but generally I’m more data driven and not in the business of conducting colonoscopies of goats and sheep for clues about the future. The Ides did not disappoint this year, as it turns out. The big event of the week was the failure of the Silicon Valley Bank, who stands accused of ignoring an iron-clad law of financing—they were inadequately hedged against rising interest rates, and lost a bundle when forced to sell a bond investment at a huge loss.

A banking collapse was not likely on the long list of worries that plague the digital entrepreneur. What are the kinds of risks that digital startups face in oil and gas? March 15 stands in infamy as the day that Julius Caesar was stabbed to death at a meeting of the Roman Senate. The conspirators, led by Brutus and Cassius, were ratted out by a seer, who ominously warned Caesar that harm would come to him that day, advice that Caesar pointedly ignored because: <ol> <li>he was arrogant, popular and successful—precisely why the Senators chose to off him, and</li> <li>the seer was not unhelpful in clarifying exactly when the harm would come, where in Rome, and what form the harm might take.</li> </ol> With hindsight, ‘Beware the Ides’ was sound advice from the seer, who apparently derived his insights by consulting the entrails of recently deceased animals. I too have ‘gut instincts’, but generally I’m more data driven and not in the business of conducting colonoscopies of goats and sheep for clues about the future. The Ides did not disappoint this year, as it turns out. The big event of the week was the failure of the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/article/svb-silicon-valley-bank-collapse-timeline.html" rel="noopener nofollow" target="_blank">Silicon Valley Bank</a>, who stands accused of ignoring an iron-clad law of financing—they were inadequately hedged against rising interest rates, and lost a bundle when forced to sell a bond investment at a huge loss.

Beware The Digital Ides of March

The biggest new supply of energy after renewables will not come from a new oil and gas field, but from virtualized energy. A few years ago, we bought a mobile battery booster pack (itself includes a lead acid battery) for just such emergencies, but we had never plugged in it, it too was dead, and worst of all, beyond recovery. We called around only to discover that there’s no publicly accessible mobile battery boosting service in our little town. And now both that little vehicle lead acid battery and gasoline tank are about to give way to a much larger lithium ion battery in an electric vehicle. A vehicle battery will store enough power to run much of your household needs (short of heat) for 10 days or longer. No more visits to the gas station. Instead, all those vehicle batteries will have to plug into the power grid to get power (or to the home solar panel system if you have that kind of money) called ‘grid to vehicle’ or G2V. Power utilities have conveniently strung copper wires to virtually to every street corner. Through that same plug, power can be dispatched back to the grid, or ‘vehicle to grid’, aka V2G. Plug in all these vehicles to draw power at the same time and we’ll bring the grid to its knees. On the other hand, plug in enough vehicles with some software smarts at the same time, and an enormous amount of that battery power can be simultaneously dispatched back to the grid. The biggest oil discovery of my generation was in Detroit in the form of a technology shift. The adoption of battery electric vehicles is unlocking the largest new supply of power in the form of virtual power plants, and at the same time, hammering gasoline demand, natural gas investment and power generation.

The biggest new supply of energy after renewables will not come from a new oil and gas field, but from virtualized energy. A few years ago, we bought a mobile battery booster pack (itself includes a lead acid battery) for just such emergencies, but we had never plugged in it, it too was dead, and worst of all, beyond recovery. We called around only to discover that there’s no publicly accessible mobile battery boosting service in our little town. And now both that little vehicle lead acid battery and gasoline tank are about to give way to a much larger lithium ion battery in an electric vehicle. A vehicle battery will store enough power to run much of your household needs (short of heat) for 10 days or longer. No more visits to the gas station. Instead, all those vehicle batteries will have to plug into the power grid to get power (or to the home solar panel system if you have that kind of money) called ‘grid to vehicle’ or G2V. Power utilities have conveniently strung copper wires to virtually to every street corner. Through that same plug, power can be dispatched back to the grid, or ‘vehicle to grid’, aka V2G. Plug in all these vehicles to draw power at the same time and we’ll bring the grid to its knees. On the other hand, plug in enough vehicles with some software smarts at the same time, and an enormous amount of that battery power can be simultaneously dispatched back to the grid. The biggest oil discovery of my generation was in Detroit in the form of a technology shift. The adoption of battery electric vehicles is unlocking the largest new supply of power in the form of virtual power plants, and at the same time, hammering gasoline demand, natural gas investment and power generation.

How Virtual Power Plants Will Strand Power Generation

New sophisticated artificial intelligence tools are coming to oil and gas. There’s plenty of upside, but lots of worries too. Language processing has been one of those things that humans have claimed to be uniquely of our species. Sure, other creatures are known to communicate with each other using sound—whales sing, dolphins chirp, and dogs bark—but only humans have created symbols to abstractly represent language, to allow language to be taught, to codify its usage, and to reduce the potential for misinterpretation. Imagine a bot with unlimited patience, unlimited but flawed technical depth on a range of topics, continuously learning, fluent in multiple languages, globally consistent, universally available, supremely self confident, frequently wrong, and massively parallel. Imagine if that bot relied instead on much internal corporate resources, and not exclusively on the flawed information sources of the wild internet. How might such a content machine impact the oil and gas sector?

New sophisticated artificial intelligence tools are coming to oil and gas. There’s plenty of upside, but lots of worries too. Language processing has been one of those things that humans have claimed to be uniquely of our species. Sure, other creatures are known to communicate with each other using sound—whales sing, dolphins chirp, and dogs bark—but only humans have created symbols to abstractly represent language, to allow language to be taught, to codify its usage, and to reduce the potential for misinterpretation. Imagine a bot with unlimited patience, unlimited but flawed technical depth on a range of topics, continuously learning, fluent in multiple languages, globally consistent, universally available, supremely self confident, frequently wrong, and massively parallel. Imagine if that bot relied instead on much internal corporate resources, and not exclusively on the flawed information sources of the wild internet. How might such a content machine impact the oil and gas sector?

How ChatGPT Will Eat Oil and Gas

"You've got huge amounts of data, and siloed, across many different teams and many deep technical disciplines. And that makes it really hard to get the full picture. And without the full picture, it's really hard to optimize something." In this episode, I’m in conversation with Riley O’Donnell, who is the CEO and co-founder of Endla. The potential to optimize a gigantic industry of unimaginably value with almost unlimited number of variables in the face of constantly improving technology is unbounded. "Maybe it's a $100 million dollar problem that you have to have before you can really justify pulling a room of 10 engineers together for a day or two. But when you've got information assets that can help you solve that, all of a sudden, you can be tackling 20 $10 million problems across that same period of time." It’s so hard to tackle the $100m problems that there’s no capacity to go after the $20m problems. But with better tools that break down the information silos across technical disciplines, these problems become solveable much more quickly.  "Because it's quite complex, and there's many different dials and knobs you can turn when approaching a problem, means the solution space is very, very large." Riley O’Donnell is the co-founder and CEO of Endla. Endla began through Riley's experience in industry as a process engineer, where he built internal software to help his team do its job at both ExxonMobil and Santos. He saw the benefit of the software first hand, however, but also saw that these organisations were unable to maintain it long term. At Endla, Riley is combining engineering and software skills to provide the next generation of software to engineers working with physical assets. "The reason we're focused on unconventionals is because it's a bit of a factory operation. It's really how efficiently and cost effectively can you put these wells in the ground." USEFUL LINKS   LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):     Personal: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rileyodonnell-1/   Business: https://www.linkedin.com/company/endla/    Website:     Https://Endla.com    

"You've got huge amounts of data, and siloed, across many different teams and many deep technical disciplines. And that makes it really hard to get the full picture. And without the full picture, it's really hard to optimize something." In this episode, I’m in conversation with Riley O’Donnell, who is the CEO and co-founder of Endla. The potential to optimize a gigantic industry of unimaginably value with almost unlimited number of variables in the face of constantly improving technology is unbounded. "Maybe it's a $100 million dollar problem that you have to have before you can really justify pulling a room of 10 engineers together for a day or two. But when you've got information assets that can help you solve that, all of a sudden, you can be tackling 20 $10 million problems across that same period of time." It’s so hard to tackle the $100m problems that there’s no capacity to go after the $20m problems. But with better tools that break down the information silos across technical disciplines, these problems become solveable much more quickly.  "Because it's quite complex, and there's many different dials and knobs you can turn when approaching a problem, means the solution space is very, very large." Riley O’Donnell is the co-founder and CEO of Endla. Endla began through Riley's experience in industry as a process engineer, where he built internal software to help his team do its job at both ExxonMobil and Santos. He saw the benefit of the software first hand, however, but also saw that these organisations were unable to maintain it long term. At Endla, Riley is combining engineering and software skills to provide the next generation of software to engineers working with physical assets. "The reason we're focused on unconventionals is because it's a bit of a factory operation. It's really how efficiently and cost effectively can you put these wells in the ground." USEFUL LINKS <ul> <li> LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):  </li> <ul> <li> Personal: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/rileyodonnell-1/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/in/rileyodonnell-1/</a> </li> <li> Business: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/endla/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/company/endla/</a> </li> </ul> <li> Website:  </li> <ul> <li> <a href="Https://Endla.com" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Https://Endla.com</a> </li> </ul> </ul>

Riley O’Donnell on Using Digital Tools To Help Upstream With Optimization

With payments technology innovating at a rapid clip, are energy companies ready to overhaul their snail-like order to cash processes? In the digital world, payments technology is evolving very rapidly. Micro payments, automated payments, direct deposits, touchless payments, 100% cashless businesses, crypto exchange, non-bank banks, novel debit and credit payment solutions, loyalty points for goods and services, payment through apps… the list goes on. But what about the energy industry? Of course, the energy sector has some unique features that make it harder to adopt these new payment mechanisms, but several innovations could transform one of the sector’s biggest headaches. There is a huge prize to be captured here, amounting to fully 10% of the cost of large energy enterprises, once carrying costs for all purchase activity is factored in. And with interest rates on the rise, financing that float is about to get a lot more expensive for everyone. Fortunately we have all the digital tools at hand to turn that snail into a proper performance vehicle. 

With payments technology innovating at a rapid clip, are energy companies ready to overhaul their snail-like order to cash processes? In the digital world, payments technology is evolving very rapidly. Micro payments, automated payments, direct deposits, touchless payments, 100% cashless businesses, crypto exchange, non-bank banks, novel debit and credit payment solutions, loyalty points for goods and services, payment through apps… the list goes on. But what about the energy industry? Of course, the energy sector has some unique features that make it harder to adopt these new payment mechanisms, but several innovations could transform one of the sector’s biggest headaches. There is a huge prize to be captured here, amounting to fully 10% of the cost of large energy enterprises, once carrying costs for all purchase activity is factored in. And with interest rates on the rise, financing that float is about to get a lot more expensive for everyone. Fortunately we have all the digital tools at hand to turn that snail into a proper performance vehicle.

Overhauling Payments in Energy

"Many people think of information as being data. But information is not necessarily data that they then can be analyzed and turned into analytics." In this episode, I’m in conversation with Chip Moldenhauer who is the Founder and CEO of Arbo, an energy data analytics firm. Compliance with energy regulations is a minimum requirement for any new energy investment. However, the regulations are not codified and structured as you’d find in an ERP system. It’s unstructured text, which means it’s time-consuming to find all the relevant regulations and figure out how they apply in a specific instance. Add in the urgency to hit climate targets and the huge wave of government funding heading into clean energy, and suddenly regulatory data analytics becomes highly valuable.  "The big problem that the industry was trying to solve as, as at least the United States, and most of the world was trying to do that shift from coal to gas, that was how long is it going to take to build transportation necessary to move that product that was going to help decarbonize the world and bring power to many more people." Chip is the founder and CEO of Arbo, an energy data analytics firm that transforms energy regulatory data into business intelligence and insights that drive infrastructure permitting and commercial decisions. Chip founded Arbo to help improve the strategic decision making needed to sustain America’s critical infrastructure, achieve energy independence and support the energy evolution. "Knowing the timing of the permitting process is directly related to how much a project is going to cost." Prior to founding Arbo, Chip practiced energy regulatory law at Morgan, Lewis &amp; Bockius, LLP and advised clients’ senior leaders on strategic solutions to high stakes regulatory, policy and litigation issues. Chip served with distinction as a naval surface warfare officer responsible for leading large engineering divisions on ships deployed overseas in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. He is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy and The Catholic University of America School of Law.  "And I think most research shows that we need to build that grid out at a rate of four to five times what we've built before." USEFUL LINKS   LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):     Personal: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chip-moldenhauer/   Business: https://www.linkedin.com/company/goarbo    Twitter handles:    @go_arbo    Website:      www.goarbo.com   

"Many people think of information as being data. But information is not necessarily data that they then can be analyzed and turned into analytics." In this episode, I’m in conversation with Chip Moldenhauer who is the Founder and CEO of Arbo, an energy data analytics firm. Compliance with energy regulations is a minimum requirement for any new energy investment. However, the regulations are not codified and structured as you’d find in an ERP system. It’s unstructured text, which means it’s time-consuming to find all the relevant regulations and figure out how they apply in a specific instance. Add in the urgency to hit climate targets and the huge wave of government funding heading into clean energy, and suddenly regulatory data analytics becomes highly valuable.  "The big problem that the industry was trying to solve as, as at least the United States, and most of the world was trying to do that shift from coal to gas, that was how long is it going to take to build transportation necessary to move that product that was going to help decarbonize the world and bring power to many more people." Chip is the founder and CEO of Arbo, an energy data analytics firm that transforms energy regulatory data into business intelligence and insights that drive infrastructure permitting and commercial decisions. Chip founded Arbo to help improve the strategic decision making needed to sustain America’s critical infrastructure, achieve energy independence and support the energy evolution. "Knowing the timing of the permitting process is directly related to how much a project is going to cost." Prior to founding Arbo, Chip practiced energy regulatory law at Morgan, Lewis &amp; Bockius, LLP and advised clients’ senior leaders on strategic solutions to high stakes regulatory, policy and litigation issues. Chip served with distinction as a naval surface warfare officer responsible for leading large engineering divisions on ships deployed overseas in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. He is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy and The Catholic University of America School of Law.  "And I think most research shows that we need to build that grid out at a rate of four to five times what we've built before." USEFUL LINKS <ul> <li> LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):  </li> <ul> <li> Personal: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/chip-moldenhauer/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/in/chip-moldenhauer/</a> </li> <li> Business: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/goarbo" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/company/goarbo</a> </li> </ul> <li> Twitter handles: </li> <ul> <li> @go_arbo </li> </ul> <li> Website:  </li> <ul> <li> <a href="http://www.goarbo.com" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">www.goarbo.com</a> </li> </ul> </ul>

Chip Moldenhauer on The Transformation of Energy Infrastructure Data Analytics

For the first time in your life, the relationships you have with your energy suppliers are contestable. But why are fossil fuel companies not in the contest?  Businesses are in continuous contests for the consumer wallet. I’m presently scheming on a house renovation program and I’ve invited four renovation contractors to the contest. My relationship with a renovation contractor is contestable at the moment but once I select someone to work with, the contest is over. How does contestability work in the context of the energy industry? As consumers, we’re conditioned to have an ambivalent unemotional relationship with our energy. It’s just there, lurking behind the light switch, or sloshing around in the gas tank, or springing into hot action when the house temperature falls too low in winter. Many people have no idea who even supplies their energy or how it gets to their homes. As a result, our relationship as energy consumers with energy suppliers is not particularly contestable. Once you sign up with a local gas or power supplier, you don’t easily or often change. It’s fire and forget. Even payments are automatic. It’s been this way for my entire life, 60+ years. And it’s all about to change.

For the first time in your life, the relationships you have with your energy suppliers are contestable. But why are fossil fuel companies not in the contest?  Businesses are in continuous contests for the consumer wallet. I’m presently scheming on a house renovation program and I’ve invited four renovation contractors to the contest. My relationship with a renovation contractor is contestable at the moment but once I select someone to work with, the contest is over. How does contestability work in the context of the energy industry? As consumers, we’re conditioned to have an ambivalent unemotional relationship with our energy. It’s just there, lurking behind the light switch, or sloshing around in the gas tank, or springing into hot action when the house temperature falls too low in winter. Many people have no idea who even supplies their energy or how it gets to their homes. As a result, our relationship as energy consumers with energy suppliers is not particularly contestable. Once you sign up with a local gas or power supplier, you don’t easily or often change. It’s fire and forget. Even payments are automatic. It’s been this way for my entire life, 60+ years. And it’s all about to change.

The Epic Contest for Tomorrow’s Energy Customer

Ken Fichtler

"There has been no device historically that can detect cannabis impairment in real time. Cannabis works very differently in the body than does alcohol. So you can measure the amount of alcohol in the body and derive the experienced impairment from that number. The same is not true of cannabis." In this episode, I’m in conversation with Ken Fichtler, the founder and CEO of Gaize. Cannabis is now legal in many places where oil and gas is produced, refined and distributed. Cannabis is increasing in  potency, people consume it more, and it lasts longer in body than alcohol, but with different impairment impacts. Without a better way to detect impairment, companies may simply not bother with any testing. Ken set out to find a digital solution to this problem, which is way harder than it sounds, but Gaize is now ready for prime time.  "Is there a way we can currently detect cannabis impairment? And the only thing that I could find were these drug recognition, expert eye tests." Ken Fichtler is the founder and CEO of Gaize, a first of its kind real-time impairment detection platform. Gaize uses analyzes eye movement changes using artificial intelligence to discover impairment from cannabis and other drugs. He’s a prior founder, proven operator, angel investor, and most recently served as Director of Economic Development for the State of Montana under Governor Steve Bullock. There he was responsible for adding thousands of jobs paying radically more than the state’s average wages, recruited leading technology companies to the state, and managed the economic response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Ken lives in Missoula, Montana with his family where he enjoys a broad variety of outdoor activities and serves on several boards. "Each class of drug has a unique bio signature that manifests in the eyes. And that basically just translates to a unique way in which the eye movement changes in response to that drug or to the impairment from that drug." USEFUL LINKS   LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):     Personal: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kenfichtler/   Business: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gaizesafety    Twitter handles:    @GaizeSafety   @kenfichtler    Facebook pages:     https://www.facebook.com/gaizesafety    Website:      https://www.gaize.ai   

"There has been no device historically that can detect cannabis impairment in real time. Cannabis works very differently in the body than does alcohol. So you can measure the amount of alcohol in the body and derive the experienced impairment from that number. The same is not true of cannabis." In this episode, I’m in conversation with Ken Fichtler, the founder and CEO of Gaize. Cannabis is now legal in many places where oil and gas is produced, refined and distributed. Cannabis is increasing in  potency, people consume it more, and it lasts longer in body than alcohol, but with different impairment impacts. Without a better way to detect impairment, companies may simply not bother with any testing. Ken set out to find a digital solution to this problem, which is way harder than it sounds, but Gaize is now ready for prime time.  "Is there a way we can currently detect cannabis impairment? And the only thing that I could find were these drug recognition, expert eye tests." Ken Fichtler is the founder and CEO of Gaize, a first of its kind real-time impairment detection platform. Gaize uses analyzes eye movement changes using artificial intelligence to discover impairment from cannabis and other drugs. He’s a prior founder, proven operator, angel investor, and most recently served as Director of Economic Development for the State of Montana under Governor Steve Bullock. There he was responsible for adding thousands of jobs paying radically more than the state’s average wages, recruited leading technology companies to the state, and managed the economic response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Ken lives in Missoula, Montana with his family where he enjoys a broad variety of outdoor activities and serves on several boards. "Each class of drug has a unique bio signature that manifests in the eyes. And that basically just translates to a unique way in which the eye movement changes in response to that drug or to the impairment from that drug." USEFUL LINKS <ul> <li> LinkedIn profiles (personal, business):  </li> <ul> <li> Personal: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/kenfichtler/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/in/kenfichtler/</a> </li> <li> Business: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/gaizesafety" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/company/gaizesafety</a> </li> </ul> <li> Twitter handles: </li> <ul> <li> @GaizeSafety </li> <li> @kenfichtler </li> </ul> <li> Facebook pages: </li> <ul> <li> <a href="https://www.facebook.com/gaizesafety" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.facebook.com/gaizesafety</a> </li> </ul> <li> Website:  </li> <ul> <li> <a href="https://www.gaize.ai" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.gaize.ai</a> </li> </ul> </ul>

Ken Fichtler on Using Digital Tools To Detect Worker Impairment

This week concludes a series I started last week on the trends to watch in 2023.  As a reminder, at the start of every year, I take a step back from the daily news feeds about energy to dwell instead on the many longer-stride trends that are impacting oil and gas. There are many ways to frame such analysis, and the framework I’m using goes by the name STEEPLE. The letters form a mnemonic, which refers to Social, Technology, Economy, Environment, Politics, Legal, and Ethical. The mnemonic started life as PEST, then evolved into STEEP, PESTLE and STEEPLE by progressively adding additional categories. This episode will focus on the back half of STEEPLE: Environment, Politics, Legal, and Ethical.  The environmental trends are those that concern themselves with our natural world. At times, the energy industry seems to be driven by a singular environmental factor—rising levels of atmospheric carbon concentration. However, there are many other worrisome trends to keep front of mind. Political trends are almost by definition country specific, but there are a few biggish ones that factor into energy calculations. The first trend is aggressive energy geopolitics. Russia has demonstrated how an autocratic political regime over time can be tempted to use a carefully constructed energy market monopoly to bend market dependents to its will. Energy importers will be careful not to lock into such dependencies in the future, and the trend will clearly be to diversify energy supply or move to self sufficiency in energy. The legal environment for energy is not static, but it doesn’t change quickly either. Nevertheless, I keep an eye on a few important trends. Activists have been successful in weaponizing legal systems in western economies to tackle the energy industry. Approval cycles for energy developments (and even housing for veterans) in the western world continue to slow down and are now structurally out of step with both the rising demand for energy and the speed society demands to deal with climate effects. It has long been recognized that there is an ethical dilemma at the very heart of the industry—the production and consumption of petroleum delivers great benefits for society but at a serious environmental and social cost. Halting the industry will quickly starve us and continuing the industry will slowly cook us.

This week concludes a series I started last week on the trends to watch in 2023.  As a reminder, at the start of every year, I take a step back from the daily news feeds about energy to dwell instead on the many longer-stride trends that are impacting oil and gas. There are many ways to frame such analysis, and the framework I’m using goes by the name <a href="https://www.delve.com/insights/how-steeple-analysis-informs-design-strategy" rel="noopener nofollow" target="_blank">STEEPLE</a>. The letters form a mnemonic, which refers to Social, Technology, Economy, Environment, Politics, Legal, and Ethical. The mnemonic started life as PEST, then evolved into STEEP, PESTLE and STEEPLE by progressively adding additional categories. This episode will focus on the back half of STEEPLE: Environment, Politics, Legal, and Ethical.  The environmental trends are those that concern themselves with our natural world. At times, the energy industry seems to be driven by a singular environmental factor—rising levels of atmospheric carbon concentration. However, there are many other worrisome trends to keep front of mind. Political trends are almost by definition country specific, but there are a few biggish ones that factor into energy calculations. The first trend is aggressive energy geopolitics. Russia has demonstrated how an autocratic political regime over time can be tempted to use a carefully constructed energy market monopoly to bend market dependents to its will. Energy importers will be careful not to lock into such dependencies in the future, and the trend will clearly be to <a href="https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/05/russia-energy-eu-oil-green-fossil-fuel/" rel="noopener nofollow" target="_blank">diversify energy supply</a> or move to self sufficiency in energy. The legal environment for energy is not static, but it doesn’t change quickly either. Nevertheless, I keep an eye on a few important trends. Activists have been successful in <a href="https://narf.org/cases/keystone/" rel="noopener nofollow" target="_blank">weaponizing legal systems</a> in western economies to tackle the energy industry. Approval cycles for energy developments (and even <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/03/signature-environmental-law-hurts-housing/618264/" rel="noopener nofollow" target="_blank">housing for veterans</a>) in the western world continue to slow down and are now structurally out of step with both the rising demand for energy and the speed society demands to deal with climate effects. It has long been recognized that there is an ethical dilemma at the very heart of the industry—the production and consumption of petroleum delivers great benefits for society but at a serious environmental and social cost. Halting the industry will quickly starve us and continuing the industry will slowly cook us.

STEEPLE Chase: What Are the Relevant Macro Trends for 2023 and Why (Part 2)

I’m a follower of much AB oil and gas activity. I’m not a digital guy. I found this informative and leading edge. Thank you.

Short concise and insightful

Digital Innovations in Oil and Gas with Geoffrey Cann

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