April 2017, Vol. 244, No. 4
Features
OTC Names 2017 Distinguished Achievement Award Recipients
The 2017 Offshore Technology Conference (OTC) will honor this year’s Distinguished Achievement Award recipients May 2 in Houston.
As part of the OTC Distinguished Achievement Awards Luncheon, the conference will recognize John Bomba for individual achievement, the LLOG Exploration Delta House Project for institutional achievement and Mike Conner for the Heritage Award; Art Schroeder will receive a special citation.
Founded in 1969, OTC joins industry leaders and professionals from over 100 countries. Its large international participation encourages global sharing of technology, expertise, products and best practices that address current and future industry conditions. The event will be held May 1-4 at NRG Park.
Individual Achievement
John Bomba will be honored with the Distinguished Achievement Award for Individuals for his far-reaching contributions to the offshore sector. He recently retired from Genesis Oil and Gas after working for over 60 years in the fields of survey, design, installation, construction and construction management for offshore and onshore pipelines and related facilities worldwide.
Bomba has been a licensed professional engineer in Texas for over 50 years and served on the OTC Program Committee and the Arctic Technology Conference oversight committee. He holds a U.S. patent and published over 30 technical papers. Bomba has pipelined (onshore and offshore) every continent except on Antarctica.
Organizational Achievement
LLOG Exploration Offshore will be presented with the OTC Distinguished Achievement Award in recognition of its outstanding work on the Delta House project. Delta House is a floating production system in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico, which the company engineered, built and operates.
The facility came online in April 2015 and has produced over 50 MMboe. The cost, time from discovery to first production, safety performance, reliability, and regulatory compliance is at an industry-leading level. The break-even price for Delta House from inception was about $27/bbl and is below $20/bbl going forward.
Heritage Award
The Heritage Award will be presented to George “Mike” Conner for championing the safe development of new technologies, specifically in the Gulf of Mexico. Conner has spent his career in the petroleum and mining industries, prior to that serving in the U.S. military. He is a technical adviser to the federal Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE).
Conner sponsored and actively participated in several joint industry projects, BSEE-sponsored research projects and other industry forums to promote development of new technologies. He also worked to identify potential hazards for each technology, develop mitigations and determine conditions of approval to allow the technology to be installed and operated.
Special Citation
The OTC will recognize Art Schroeder with a special citation. Schroeder has a career spanning 40 years in the offshore oil and gas sector. His contributions focus on crisis and risk management, research and development, and operational project management.
He served on the OTC Board of Directors during 2006-13 and was a program committee member during 1989-2013. Schroeder created The Next Wave, an OTC program for young professionals and helped produce the inaugural d5: The Next Big Thing, an OTC event designed to inspire leaders and innovators to drive exponential growth in the offshore energy sector.
Schroeder also played a key role in starting Research Partnership to Secure Energy for America (RPSEA), which enables the development of new technologies to produce more secure, abundant and affordable domestic energy.
Awards Luncheon
The OTC Distinguished Achievement Awards luncheon recognizes the OTC recipients, raises funds for a worthy cause and provides an opportunity for industry leaders to network with colleagues from around the world.
The 2017 beneficiary of the luncheon is Oilfield Helping Hands. The nonprofit organization provides financial assistance to oilfield workers in times of crisis. Specifically, the organization assists families in financial crisis due to medical and other serious circumstances.
“We’re proud to name Oilfield Helping Hands as this year’s beneficiary. The event’s Executive Advisory Board was most impressed by the organization’s commitment to helping families that have been a part of our industry and have hit hard times,” said Chairman Joe Fowler, of the OTC Board of Directors.
Oilfield Helping Hands started in 2003 when several Halliburton Baroid employees organized a clay tournament to benefit an employee whose family savings had been depleted by several serious, expensive medical treatments. The event was so successful the group decided to continue its efforts and began recruiting operator and oilfield service companies to join. Today, Oilfield Helping Hands Houston holds five annual fundraising events and has expanded with multiple chapters across the country.
“The OTC Distinguished Achievement Awards Luncheon does more than just support great causes in the industry. It also raises awareness about them,” said Gregory Rachal, president, Oilfield Helping Hands, whose organization has distributed over $3.3 million to hundreds of families since its inception.
Tickets for the event can be purchased at the time of OTC registration.
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