Our CEO Davis Larssen has provided an in-depth thought leader to the Energy Voice March Supplement published by the Press and Journal. Davis’s op-ed examines the challenges and opportunities presented by last year’s ScotWind leasing round. The article focuses on the potential creation of significant local Scottish content including the innovation of new technologies and the creation of multiple jobs, as the nation has a chance to become the global leader in floating offshore wind, harnessing much of the expertise already established in the energy sector.
This article is reproduced with the kind permission of Energy Voice. To read the article online, please click here.
Our Chief Technology Officer, Tore Erntsen has contributed a thought-provoking opinion piece to February’s Subsea Issue of OGV Energy’s monthly title. Tore focuses on the need for operators to adopt new, smarter ways of thinking around their subsea operations and to embrace technologies and methodologies that not only reduce costs and save time but, crucially, can reduce their carbon footprints too.
These articles are reproduced with the kind permission of OGV Energy. To read the full magazines, please follow this link.
Callum Maxwell, our Business Development Manager, Renewables, has been appointed as one of two new co-chairs for the operations and maintenance (O&M) subgroup within the DeepWind Cluster. He will hold this position for the next two years.
The DeepWind Cluster is the largest offshore wind representative body in Europe with 800 members drawn from industry, academia and the public sector. It is an initiative led by Offshore Wind Scotland, a partnership driven by Highlands and Islands Enterprise, alongside multiple partners including Scottish Enterprise, South of Scotland Enterprise, the Scottish Offshore Wind Energy Council (SOWEC) and the Scottish government.
Its role is to help its members achieve greater benefits from the current and future development of offshore wind in the UK and internationally. DeepWind specialises in fixed and floating offshore wind in deeper waters, usually considered to be greater than 40 metres in depth. Since the ScotWind leasing round early in 2022, the DeepWind Cluster’s geographic reach has been extended and it now incorporates 70% of the entire Scottish coastline.
Callum will be co-chair of a subgroup, focused on supporting improved operations and maintenance within the offshore wind segment, that comprises more than 200 members in its own right with many from other leading service providers, technology developers and manufacturers. Callum’s subgroup will be hosting a webinar next month on February 21st.
Speaking after his appointment, Callum Maxwell stated:
“I am delighted to have been selected to undertake this co-chair role and I look forward to helping drive and initiate future discussions focused on accelerating better O&M in the offshore wind sector and encouraging both collaboration and greater innovation. If offshore wind is to truly grow rapidly, and with success, O&M represents a key building block on that route ahead.”
The Energy Industries Council (EIC) has highlighted two of our recent technology news stories in its Inside Energy monthly title.
Last month, in its December issue, our strategic acquisition of a minority stake in Glasgow based power system monitoring expert, Synaptec, featured prominently in its news pages, while, just a month before, it was the turn of our exciting Memorandum of Understanding with UK based start-up company and real-time optimisation experts Ortomation, headed up by its CEO Paul Oram.
Jackie Lawrie and Elton Willemse from our Instrumentation & Calibration (I&C) team, based in Aberdeen, reference their adaptable certification and testing services, how they can help optimise their customers’ operational processes and highlight our Aftermarket Service Portal.
With strong production revenues across the industry through much of 2022, operators must prioritise the calibration and certification of their instrumentation as any downtime, resulting from inaccurate readings or faulty equipment, would prove very costly?
We say that no matter what the background landscape is around market sentiment, critical infrastructure and kit always need to be consistently checked and tested. This is the only way of maintaining smooth and efficient operations. So, it stands to reason the regular, accurate calibration of the master instrumentation to undertake that testing is a key piece of the equation.
Trusting in faulty metrological equipment could eventually lead to an issue regarding pressure or temperature, for example, and potential downtime. When prices are strong, any subsequent outage is expensive – on a large producing platform, even a few hours of lost production could represent hundreds of thousands of dollars. The comparison with the modest cost of deploying a trusted, regular service partner like Proserv to undertake necessary calibration checks on gauges and recorders is stark. The only option, no matter if commodity prices are high or low, is to keep instrumentation accurate and precise.
Operators do recognise the importance of this testing and they plan for shutdowns every year to carry out these vital checks through critical calibration campaigns so that their operations are always efficient, enhanced and safe.
What we then say is choose an established, highly qualified expert like Proserv to undertake this work. We offer a United Kingdom Accreditation Service (UKAS) purpose-built laboratory, mobile service capabilities and can get technicians offshore rapidly if required. Our aim is to be their go-to service vendor.
Proserv’s service support targets the optimisation of our clients’ assets and operations, where does your team add this extra value?
One of the key efficiencies that our customers gain benefit from is our online platform, this is a very useful multi-dimensional tool. It stores all relevant paperwork from the most recent test certificates through to work reports. This eliminates the need for, and the waste of, physical paper trails.
Our online resource is a secure environment, accessible to us and the customer, and it has an intuitive interface, incorporating colour-coding, so that we know when key calibration equipment is approaching recertification testing. This delivers an extra layer of scrutiny over timeframes and supports operational performance.
The equipment that will ultimately be monitored by the instrumentation we calibrate will be intrinsic to production processes offshore, so, again, making sure gauge readings can be 100% accurate and trusted is essential.
Our agile mobile lab service fleet also provides real efficiencies around time savings for our customers. We are one of only a few Aberdeen based service vendors offering UKAS approved certification and testing at our facility, but we can also deploy our servicing experts to supply national standards of calibration on a wide range of equipment via our mobile capabilities.
This can really speed up turnaround for customers. Sending equipment to our facility for certification is swift but might take a few days, with the various procedural stages then required, but by going direct to our clients’ sites, we can quite literally recertify a range of gauges in just a few hours.
As the energy transition moves forward, with increased emphasis on reducing carbon footprints, where can you make a difference?
We play an important role in extending the life of core equipment. The instrumentation that we calibrate and certify has a critical role in supporting, monitoring and providing visibility on the day-to-day, hour-by-hour, performance of production infrastructure. When we do our job, we make sure pressure relief valves, gauges, pressure recorders are all functioning well so that any fluctuations can be readily identified.
Trusting the outputs from poorly calibrated instruments not only heightens the risk of unplanned outages, but also, if an operator or drilling contractor is assessing operational impacts based on inaccurate temperature readings or pressure levels, then the wear and tear on infrastructure becomes significant and pain points are accelerated. This would reduce, not maximise, the life of this equipment.
Similarly, our Proserv ethos prioritises “refurbish not replace” and if a customer has an issue or a failure with some vital instrumentation, we have the service and maintenance abilities to see if we can repair and restore that kit as our Plan A. If so, it saves time and money (four or five test pumps could cost £50,000 to replace) and mitigates the environmental considerations around waste, the manufacture of replacement parts and their subsequent transportation.
With our rental model, and by becoming our client’s incumbent service partner, we can maximise such advantages. We can hire out freshly certified, quality instruments; manage any servicing 24/7; monitor certification schedules and swap over the kit when that needs to take place. This promotes operational excellence across the board with accurately calibrated equipment that can be entirely trusted to offer the required insights into live production processes. This gives customers performance assurance and efficiency.
This year Proserv has launched a new, updated Aftermarket Service Portal – how does this help your team and your potential clients?
The new Aftermarket Service Portal is an exciting update that is supporting Proserv teams right across our offerings and our global regions. It speeds up processes when we are looking to reach out to potential customers with information, while, from their side, they can access exactly what they are looking for really fast, get the relevant details and download brochures and spec sheets – this can all be done in ten minutes, and requests for quotes are easily built and uploaded. It is both accessible and convenient, with everything in one place.
Another important aspect for us is that it gives our I&C team wider visibility to more possible clients – and the same for other Proserv offerings too. For instance, our IWOCS or Measurement teams might have some long-standing partners who value their specific expertise and services, but these customers are currently unaware that Proserv also delivers I&C know-how, products and rental packages. This new service portal enables those parties to consider us now, and not simply go to one of our competitors as they may have done previously. This will potentially drive more opportunities our way.
We also believe this portal can make more operators aware of our renowned service capabilities. We have a very persuasive rental model but, again, we want to inform prospective customers, who have multiple gauges, relief valves and other instrumentation needing checking and maintenance on vessels and platforms, that we also have the agility and expertise to supply that support.
Late last year, our VP, Services Angus Rodger participated in a Business Breakfast discussion panel hosted by OGV Energy and held on the sidelines of the ADIPEC Exhibition and Conference in Abu Dhabi. The panel covered a broad number of themes and Angus spoke about evolving mindsets and trends in the service segment, as well as our exciting path forwards into innovating digital technologies, harnessing data analytics, aimed at optimising our customers’ assets and extending the life of critical infrastructure.
Chris Denton, Proserv’s Director, Supply Chain reveals how reaching out is essential when the global landscape is so changeable.
The importance of direct communication and effective collaboration for Proserv’s supply chain function is critical in today’s uncertain world.
We have experienced unprecedented challenges over recent years from devastating natural disasters and the Covid-19 global pandemic, through to ceaseless economic and trade disputes and, most recently, warfare with the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The latter has compounded an already testing situation exacerbating inflationary pressures, spiking material costs and commodity price instability, while undermining energy security and vital supply chains across the continents.
Recently, the strength of the US dollar against multiple currencies including a weak British pound has been a challenge for us at Proserv, while, locally in the UK, we have also had to contend with industrial disputes causing supply chain bottlenecks and rendering freight and product inaccessible for extended periods.
So, when there are so many uncertainties, so many moving parts to assess, within Proserv’s supply chain function, we recognise the value of ensuring we deploy effective supplier outreach and collaboration to reinforce our business goals both on a day-to-day and at a strategic level.
From regular calls and meetings to expediting, supplier audits, workshops and specific project assistance, a high level of engagement and collaboration is vital to support both internal and external stakeholders.
Supplier Engagement Days
Proserv has taken this template further by successfully holding Supplier Engagement Days in our Abu Dhabi and Great Yarmouth locations through 2022, and we intend to continue these events across Dubai, Chennai, Houston and Stavanger in 2023.
Such meetings enable a wealth of key themes to be covered from providing a global overview and update on the business, alongside strategy and future direction, through to feedback on the external market landscape and, crucially, the core deliverables we require at Proserv and where we would value further help and support.
For instance, at our Supplier Engagement Day in Great Yarmouth, we were able to relay direct, tangible feedback from customers about the importance of delivery and how delays could have knock-on effects around costs and schedules due to unplanned downtime. If a supply chain misses its targets, then there can be disruption for clients and that will impact future opportunities.
In our current changeable times, one of the messages that we have put across at these events is the need for our suppliers (and their own suppliers) to be proactive with regard to future planning to effectively de-risk the wider supply chain so that ultimately any potential scheduling issues for the customer are alleviated and turnaround times are minimised.
Equally, we have been able to have valuable dialogue concerning quality and emphasising our necessary technical requirements when it comes to product and components. Much of our equipment is deployed in challenging environments, often subsea where there are severe temperature or pressure differentials, and so safety, reliability, durability and high quality are always paramount. It was rewarding for the suppliers to hear directly from our engineers and technicians about the background as to why and how products needed to be manufactured to certain specifications and standards.
Great feedback, great Proserv values
Already, we have received very positive responses to our Supplier Engagement Days with many external attendees highlighting Proserv’s openness and collaborative approach, as well as the opportunity to learn more about our business from processes to strategy.
But one of the recurring themes has been commendation of our Proserv values. These supplier events capture several of our core FRESH values but especially “Help, Share and Communicate”. It has been inspiring to see so much of our company’s talent and know-how come together to contribute to and drive these valuable sessions.
Supplier collaboration is allowing Proserv to navigate its way through the unpredictable operating conditions we currently face by supporting our key strategic initiatives.
Proserv has once again earned silverware from a leading industry body, with Laura Carrigan, a Graduate Applications Engineer at our Centre of Excellence in Great Yarmouth, deservedly being chosen as Early Career Professional of the Year by Offshore Energies UK (OEUK) at a ceremony last night.
The OEUK Awards 2022 were held at the P&J Live in Aberdeen, with Proserv boasting a strong presence to support Laura’s shortlisting. Chairman David Currie and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Davis Larssen were among those in attendance. Winners across eight categories were selected from a total of 24 shortlisted finalists after scores of applications were whittled down earlier in the autumn.
Speaking ahead of the awards ceremony, Deirdre Michie, OEUK’s CEO commented, “It’s important we continue to recognise and congratulate the hard work and talent of our community – especially at a time where our sector is changing and pioneering new ways of working to help the country move towards its net zero goals while helping to ensure we deliver security of energy supply.”
Laura joined Proserv in early 2021 and in less than two years with the company, she has become a key member of our innovative and growing team, contributing significantly to the rollout of our ECG™ holistic subsea cable monitoring system for offshore wind. Our Vice President, Renewables, Paul Cook was also present at the P&J to offer Laura his support on the night.
At the start of this year, after barely 12 months with the business, Laura was the winner of a Proserv FRESH Award in the Help, Share and Communicate category. Laura has a real passion for, and commitment to sustainability and she is a leading member of our Carbon Action Group, which plays a vital role in aiding our work to fulfil our mission of becoming a net zero emissions company by 2050 or sooner.
Laura is also a strong advocate for encouraging young people to pursue careers in engineering and the STEM subjects and she regularly gives talks to university undergraduates and Girl Guides to communicate her own enthusiasm and experience.
After securing the prize, Laura said:
“I am absolutely delighted to win this award and firstly I would like to congratulate the other finalists on their well-deserved recognition. I must thank the judges and OEUK for selecting me and for making this wonderful event possible.”
“But I also need to express my gratitude to Proserv for providing me with such an opportunity to contribute to an exciting and growing part of its business, to have a role in the on-going transition at such a critical time for the energy industry and for supporting me in my development and early career. To have been considered for nomination was really motivating, so to go on and win the award itself is truly special.”
Paul Cook remarked:
“This acclaim is very well-deserved. Laura initially joined us in 2019 as a three-month student intern. In that short time she contributed significantly to a FEED study exploring the technical basis for our future innovation of a disruptive new solution for subsea cable monitoring that would harness our existing Proserv technologies and expertise. This study was one of the first stepping stones to the development of the ECG™ system.
“Since then, Laura has come into the team as an applications engineer and her undoubted talents and potential are bringing major impacts as we seek to develop further exciting technologies for the offshore wind segment.”
Davis Larssen commented:
“Congratulations to Laura on this excellent achievement. Although she has only been with Proserv for a short time, she has made an immediate and positive impression. Our renewables strategy is a core part of Proserv’s future direction and growth strategy and Laura is already a key contributor to this work.”
“Her role as a leader within our Carbon Action Group is equally important as we seek to make and identify the necessary operational efficiencies that will help us with our target of becoming a carbon net zero company in the years to come.”
David Currie observed:
“Nurturing and developing young talent sits at the heart of Proserv’s values and so it is excellent to see Laura’s potential and capability highlighted in this way. I first met Laura at an offshore wind exhibition soon after she joined us and her enthusiasm and knowledge shone through.”
“As we look ahead to the future of our industry, Laura and her generation have a tremendous opportunity to become the ultimate baton carriers for the on-going energy transition. Laura has the passion and motivation to play a vital part in that task.”
Tie-up augments Proserv’s sand sampling system design and manufacturing capabilities with SMS’s real-time monitoring and analytics solutions.
Global controls technology company Proserv has announced that it has signed an agreement with Aberdeen based sand and erosion monitoring, analytics and management experts SMS.
The deal sees SMS become the exclusive agent and representative for Proserv’s sampling activities across Malaysia. The arrangement brings Proserv’s sampling system know-how, equipment design and high-quality manufacturing, delivering safe, enclosed and portable solutions, together with SMS’s sand monitoring technologies.
SMS engages non-intrusive corrosion and erosion sensors to supply real-time monitoring and data acquisition which when analysed and interpreted by subject matter experts can enable swift identification of incipient problems that, without appropriate intervention, could halt production via equipment damage or failure.
It is expected that Proserv and SMS’s combined offering will give clients a step change in the visibility of the condition and integrity of flowlines and, through the live measurement of sand quantities, will allow operators to make informed early strategy decisions around production rates, maintenance planning and ultimately the life of critical infrastructure.
Malaysia and the wider Southeast Asia region have a significant need for effective, real-time monitoring and assessment of sand levels in oil and gas production flowlines to alleviate erosion risks, improve safety and reduce the threat of downtime.
Andrew Kinsler, Operations Director, SMS commented:
“We are delighted to formalise the signing of this agreement to act as Proserv’s representative in Malaysia, as this underpins a truly constructive and on-going working relationship. Proserv has a reputation for innovating disruptive solutions to support improved efficiencies, better reliability of infrastructure and ultimately the optimisation of assets.”
“This is equally what we at SMS provide to the market, around the globe, with our cutting-edge sand monitoring, integrity management and data analytics solutions, substantially enhancing the well performance of our clients. Malaysia represents the first market region where our combined SMS and Proserv offering could make a real difference to production levels and performance.”
As part of the tie-up, Proserv will also establish a service centre in Malaysia located at SMS’s local facility in Labuan. This will be based upon the successful model in operation at Proserv’s main Sampling Centre of Excellence in Aberdeen and at its sites in the US, Norway, the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. The centre will supply both servicing and sampling equipment rental.
Following the signing of the agreement, Proserv’s General Manager, Sampling, Sean Andersson added:
“Forging this arrangement with SMS is an exciting development for Proserv’s global sampling business. SMS offers genuinely impactful monitoring capabilities and we believe that our collaboration, fusing our own renowned system design expertise with such digital technologies, will advance real gains and benefits to the Malaysian market.”
“There are many synergies between our businesses, particularly in terms of our value proposition for our customers, and so we will seek to identify further ways by which we can maximise this tie-up more widely.”
An in-depth video interview that our Vice President, Services, Angus Rodger gave to major Middle East energy news platform Energy Connects against the backdrop of the ADIPEC Exhibition and Conference earlier this month has now gone live. In a wide-ranging discussion, Angus speaks about the current strategic priorities in the energy industry, how we are driving forward with exciting technology innovation and looking forward to yet another positive year in 2023.