December 2015 Vol. 242, No. 12

Features

Company & Association News

Association News

Ralph A. LaRossa was elected chairman of the board of directors of the American Gas Association for 2016. LaRossa is president and COO of Public Service Electric and Gas Company (PSE&G) in New Jersey.

AGA’s other board officers will be: First Vice Chair Pierce H. Norton, II, president & CEO, ONE Gas, Inc. (Tulsa, OK); Second Vice Chair Kimberly J. Harris, president & CEO, Puget Sound Energy (Bellevue, WA); Dave McCurdy, president & CEO, AGA, and Immediate Past Chair Terry D. McCallister, chairman & CEO, WGL Holdings, Inc. (Washington, DC). A complete list of board member is www.aga.org.

In other news, AGA presented the 2015 Distinguished Service Award to James H. DeGraffenreidt, Jr., former chairman and CEO of both WGL Holdings, Inc. and Washington Gas Light.

Republican Congressman Lamar Smith, chairman of the House Science, Space & Technology Committee, was honored with the Congressman of the Year Award by the Texas Alliance of Energy Producers. Smith has been active in writing legislation that would require federal regulatory agencies to show the science used in support of new restrictions on industry.

Personnel Changes
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Smith
Kevin Smith was named president of HammerHead® Trenchless Equipment, a Charles Machine Works company. Smith had been serving as president of MTI® Equipment, a Charles Machine Works company – as is Ditch Witch®, where he was director of product definition and research, product planning manager, business manager and salesman.

Aux Sable Companies announced that Tim Stauft, president and CEO of Aux Sable has resigned to pursue other opportunities. Tom Day who joined Aux Sable in 2013 was appointed president and CEO of the companies.
Henkels & McCoy, Inc. promoted Kevin Pedigo to business line director, Pipeline Services based in Birdsboro, PA.

Greene’s Energy Group, LLC named Matt McIntosh as a key account manager to be based in Houston.

EnLink Midstream and EnLink Midstream Partners, LP named Christopher H. Tennant senior vice president, Commercial. Tennant will be responsible for the commercial functions of the NGL and crude oil teams.

Joan Barminski was named regional director of the Pacific Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) Region.
Lou Smith has joined Hobart Institute of Welding Technology.

Monterra Energy has appointed John O’Beirne as director of Projects and Construction based in Mexico City.

Rodney (Rod) J. Sailor was named executive vice president and CFO of Enable Midstream Partners, LP. He succeeds Pete Delaney who served as interim president and CEO after the departure of former CEO Lynn L. Bourdon. Sailor will also be president and CEO of Enable Midstream Partners.

Two Chevron Corp. executives will assume new roles effective Jan. 1. Michael Wirth, executive vice president, Downstream and Chemicals, will become executive vice president for Midstream and Development. Pierre Breber, executive vice president, Gas and Midstream, will become executive vice president, Downstream and Chemicals.
Mitchell W. Ingram was named executive vice president, Global LNG at Anadarko Petroleum Corp.

Company News, Mergers & Acquisitions

The ROSEN Group of Switzerland was recipient of the 2015 Global Pipeline Award for an innovative device that uses a sensor to determine material specifications in petroleum pipelines. The Pipeline Systems Division of The American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) presented the award at the Rio Pipeline Conference held in September in Brazil. ROSEN won for RoMat PGS-ILI solution for Pipe Grade Determination. The ILI tool uses especially adapted electro-magnetic sensor technology to determine yield strength and ultimate tensile strength in pipe joints.

Michels Senior Vice President Mike Prior, center, received a certificate honoring Michels safety campaign, Promise Me, a video campaign that featured employees’ families asking them to promise to always work safely. Prior received the certificate from Bruno Maerten, left, and Jean Claude van de Wiele at the International Pipe Line and Offshore Contractors Association (IPLOCA) convention in Singapore. The award honored Michels as a runner-up in the 2015 IPLOCA Health and Safety Award sponsored by Chevron.

McElroy added Industrial Municipal Supply Co., Inc. (IMSCO) of Geismar, LA as a new distributor to serve pipe fusion machine customers throughout Louisiana. IMSCO will sell McElroy equipment for both HDPE pipe used commonly on natural gas, large-scale water and industrial projects as well as polypropylene pipe, which is emerging in the indoor plumbing and mechanical market.

Ditch Witch®, a Charles Machine Works Company, hosted its annual international customer event Oct. 23 at the Ditch Witch Barcelona Support Center in Barcelona, Spain. The event set a record with nearly 300 customers and staff from across Europe, Middle East and Africa in attendance. The event concluded with a gala reception and dinner where guests heard from Ditch Witch President Dennis Wierzbicki, as well as international sales manager Joe Smith Jr. and European sales manager Brian Jorgensen.

Wood Group was awarded a multimillion-dollar contract by Bechtel to provide an automation solution consisting of detailed engineering, control hardware and remote instrument enclosures (RIEs) for Tengizchevroil’s (TCO’s) crude storage capacity project at the Tengiz Field in Kazakhstan. The project will increase capacity of the tank farm to accommodate the upgrading of the existing tank farm.

Wood Group was also awarded a $31 million, 12-month contract by Carbon Creek Energy on its coalbed methane asset in the Powder River basin in Wyoming. Wood Group PSN will deliver operations management services to the field, the largest of its kind in the region, consists of 7,000 drilled wells, 6,000-12,000 drillable locations and produces 385 MMcf/d of gas.

GE Oil & Gas launched a program for gas compression packagers. Houston-based manufacturing specialist AFGlobal signed to become the first participant. The program seeks to provide end-user customers with increased access to GE’s High-Speed Reciprocating (HSR) and Ajax products and field services.

KBR finalized two partnerships with Bernhard Capital Partners (BCP). One partnership is the equally owned and managed company, Brown & Root Industrial Services, under which all of KBR’s U.S. and Canadian industrial services and on-call construction now operate.

Under the other partnership, all of KBR’s Canadian pipe fabrication business has become Falcon Fabricators and Modular Builders, a subsidiary of EPIC Piping, a BCP portfolio company in which KBR is a minority limited partner. This partnership will enhance KBR’s delivery performance providing access to all of EPIC’s pipe fabrication facilities in Louisiana and Texas.

Praxair, Inc. announced that nearly 100 welding students are graduating from the inaugural Skills Pipeline program in Louisiana. Skills Pipeline, funded by Praxair’s Global Giving Program, provided over $300,000 to train new welders in an accelerated one-year curriculum through Baton Rouge Community College, Delgado Community College and SOWELA Technical Community College. The company will expand the program across the country next year.

Global Data Systems, Inc., located at 310 Laser Lane in Lafayette, LA celebrated the grand opening of its new international headquarters Oct. 28.

Aker Solutions and MAN Diesel & Turbo will develop the next generation in subsea compression systems that can be used at even the smallest oil and gas fields to increase recovery and lower costs compared with conventional platform solutions.

Obituary

Harold Lloyd Chapman, 83, passed away on October 31, 2015 at home with his family by his side.

He was born to Cecil and Erma Chapman in Culloden, WV. Joining the National Guard in 1950, he became active in the regular Army in 1952. He was later deployed to England and received the National Defense Service Metal prior to his discharge.

In 1973, Chapman founded H.L. Chapman Pipeline Inc.

He is survived by his wife Linda; daughters Taria Boren and finance Kenneth McAister, Donna Winberley, Melissa Wilson (Michael) and son Harold Chapman Jr. (Tracy).