Another week, another scan of the Saturday Star newspaper. Here’s a list of job ads in the paper:
Happy hunting. Let me have some feedback if you find this list useful. Even better, spread the news. PayPal donations welcome.
Leave a Comment » | 
engineering, Malaysia, oil and gas | Tagged: optimal, orogenic, sabic | 
Permalink
Posted by Wata
Ah, the new signage for the Terengganu Crude Oil Terminal (TCOT) and Onshore Slug Catcher (OSC) are up.
9 Comments | engineering, Malaysia, oil and gas | Tagged: Kerteh, KIPP, OSC, Paka, TCOT | Permalink
Posted by Wata
Different assets have varied approaches to the disposal of human waste products . The ones I am familiar with have all products are disposed of directly into the sea via a caisson / pile. Makes for a real simple design. Though, even then you can get it wrong:
I have worked on a project that required a full septic system. There was a bit of head scratching there. First time I thought of picking up a civil engineering book. Concept’s easy, have a tank to ferment solid products, send the water to the sea. But who does the septic tank cleaning? Indah Water?
Batfish Racha Yai Phuket
3 Comments | engineering, Malaysia, oil and gas | Tagged: toilets | Permalink
Posted by Wata
Another week, another scan of the Saturday Star newspaper. I’ve been on holiday for the past few days, so expect to see photos of folks I met in that time.
Here’s a list of job ads in the paper:
Happy hunting. Let me have some feedback if you find this list useful. Even better, spread the news. PayPal donations welcome.
Leave a Comment » | engineering, Malaysia, oil and gas | Tagged: Amec, Mahkota, MMC, MMHE, Talisman, titan | Permalink
Posted by Wata
Okay, sue me for repeating a previous article.
To quote an extract from a notice I saw:
Today, July 1, 2008, the operatorship of the Terengganu Crude Oil Terminal, Onshore Slugcatcher and condensate facilities was officially handed over to PETRONAS Carigali. The transfer of operatorship of these onshore facilities to PETRONAS Carigali is part of the terms of the Main Principles Agreement of the 2008 PSC that was signed by ExxonMobil, PETRONAS and PETRONAS Carigali last March 26.
Go visit Kerteh and visit the sites.
Leave a Comment » | Malaysia, oil and gas | Tagged: Kerteh, Kertih, OSC, PCSB, Petronas, TCOT | Permalink
Posted by Wata
A while back, I shared the news that Malaysia Gas would raise the price of natural gas, effective July 1st, 2008
On July 1st, 2008, the government decided not to increase gas prices. Taking the following from The Star,
PETALING JAYA (July 2nd, 208): The implementation of a new gas price scheduled for Tuesday has been deferred to a later date, the Economic Planning Unit of the Prime Minister’s Department said in a statement.
The statement referred to the Government’s earlier decision on June 4 in relation to the restructuring of petrol, diesel and gas subsidies.
Under the restructuring exercise, gas price in Peninsular Malaysia was to be increased effective Tuesday.
Malaysians get a reprieve.
Leave a Comment » | Malaysia, oil and gas | Tagged: gas price | Permalink
Posted by Wata
All the oil and gas platforms I’ve been to have devices colloquially known as watermakers. They are desalination units that convert seawater into potable water. They usual work by reverse osmosis, as I assume thermal desalinators use too much power. Examples of watermakers are by C’Treat and Village Marine.
The commercial ones you see installed in front of shops in Malaysia work on the same principles, though they don’t work under the same conditions (they only filter good old M’sian tap water).
You know the offshore watermaker isn’t working correctly when water tastes brackish.
11 Comments | engineering, oil and gas | Permalink
Posted by Wata
You can’t miss the announcement that Microsoft will stop selling Windows XP as a retail product after today (30th June, 2008). It will still be supported till 2014. Considering it was introduced in October 2001, it has had a long streak.
Now, how long do you expect offshore hardware to be supported? For field instrumentation, you really don’t care. Discontinued? As long as you have the original specs and current requirements for the item, you are covered. You usually replace the whole item, not individual components like displays, power board and logic circuits.
Machinery is another matter. You have sunk, oh say USD8M in a compressor/turbogenerator package which is meant to last the life of the platform (20 years). You need support for that whole period, either with the vendor maintaining a warehouse of replacement parts, or a part-by-part or bundle-by-bundle upgrade program. I would say that this program is similar to aircraft engine upgrade schemes, seeing that offshore generators are generally aero-derivatives to save weight, i.e. having a large power to weight ratio (efficiency is another matter).
The one that would trouble me are the brains of the asset. This would cover flow computers, DCS, PCS, SCADA, MMI, SDS, F&G. The vendor has to provide hardware and software support for yonks (or the term stipulated in the PO). And us consumers know how fast electronics evolve. That cool Zip drive of 1998 is no longer in sight. When was the last time you saw a floppy? 50MB hard drives are now hard to come by. Electronics are proprietary (sorry, Low Yat plaza). Replacing or upgrading these systems are not as easy as picking out the successor from a vendor catalog. Months and years of planning are in place, usually requiring an asset shutdown (USD80/bbl x 100 kbl/d x 4 days…). There are redundancies in place, but it still requires a something akin to a heart-lung transplant. kudos to the I&E surgeons for performing the surgery under pressure.
I don’t worry about PLCs not so much, as I suspect they are easier to replace, similar to field instruments.
Me, I’m a process guy. I deal with vessels and stuff, no electronics to worry about. Though, a pressure surge can really damage orifice plates, vane mist pads… buy a replacement in Balakong, that’s the ticket.
1 Comment | engineering, Malaysia, oil and gas | Tagged: electronics, obsolesce, offshore hardware | Permalink
Posted by Wata
I was introduced to the ‘blue ocean’ strategy on the 25th, when the IEM arranged a visit to PETRONAS’s Prince Court Hospital. The strategy involves you choosing a market where there are no competitors (swimming alone in the ocean blue, get it?).
All of the oil and gas businesses of note I know swim in red oceans, where we fight and cut and tear at each other.
In the oil and gas industry, you can start out with a niche market (ex. high end process consultancy, HAZOP leadership, good engineering when your competitors are rubbish) which you hope you have no competition, but when you want to play with the big boys, you have to go head-to-head. If you are successful, you create a blue ocean for yourself by buying up (or bumping off) your rivals.
So, you can go blue ocean – red ocean -> blue ocean. If you don’t see that cycle, you’re doing it wrong, at least in Malaysian territorial waters.
3 Comments | business opportunity, engineering, Malaysia, oil and gas | Tagged: blue ocean, competition | Permalink
Posted by Wata
You never know what item can come back and haunt you. Here’s an example from an oil and gas client I have worked with. They have custody measurement systems (who doesn’t), and they use supervisory metering computers to manage the flow computers available at particular assets.
Now, all the SMCs run their programs in an environment called Citect. They have had environments and application software developed by the local, Malaysian team, and others developed overseas. You would have thought that the two would play nicely together, wouldn’t you?
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.
The overseas developer didn’t (wouldn’t) give the source files to the local folks. Hence, any work that needs to be done on the MCS has to be sourced back overseas. You can understand why this foobar gives grief to client, and why they are thinking of replacing these made-in-Westernstan system with homegrown apps.
How about something closer to home. Did you know that the HP Photosmart 3310 all-in-one has region encoded ink cartridges? You know about DVDs, Wiis and warranties, but actual print cartridges? Makes you want to buy region-free printers:
“Boss, ini printer boleh pakai cartridge chiplak?”
1 Comment | Malaysia, oil and gas | Tagged: Citect, custody measurement, HP | Permalink
Posted by Wata
You are currently browsing the archives for the oil and gas category.
Paypal donations accepted.
Wata - Malaysian Oil and Gas Engineer 