Nine Major Oil Companies Launch Subsea Well Response Project

16 May 2011

BG Group, BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, Petrobras, Shell, Statoil and Total – have announced the launch of the Subsea Well Response Project (SWRP), an initiative designed to enhance the industry's capability to respond to subsea well control incidents.

Acting on the recommendations of the International Association of Oil & Gas Producers' (OGP) Global Industry Response Group (GIRG) the companies have signed an Interim Joint Development Agreement, with Shell as the operator.

The project team will:

● Design a capping toolbox with a range of equipment to allow wells to be shut in.
● Design additional hardware for the subsea injection of dispersant.
● Further assess the need for and feasibility of a containment system for shared use.

The SWRP participants have appointed Keith Lewis, former Vice President of Front-End Studies for Shell in the Americas, as manager of the project. "OGP [GIRG] has brought forward a comprehensive set of recommendations for intervention on flowing wells following a well control incident. SWRP will now work to deliver on these objectives over the course of 2011. Designing systems that can be deployed effectively in different regions of the world is an immense challenge but member companies have assigned leading specialists to the task,” Lewis said.