COMPANY PROFILE
2015
Nederlandse Aardolie Maatschappij
www.namproject.com | +39 331 2259523
Shoring Up the Energy Supply Editorial: Tim Hands
Nederlandse Aardolie Maatschappij (NAM) began its exploration and production of oil and gas, both offshore and onshore in the Netherlands, in 1947. Since this time, it has honed its main objectives of sustaining production from existing fields, exploring for and developing new fields, and obtaining more gas from existing fields through a continuous policy of using innovative techniques.
Headquartered in Assen, in the Netherlands, NAM goes about its core business of exploring for and producing oil and gas, both on land and offshore, in a safe, sustainable and efficient way. A company with authentic and proven Dutch roots, NAM is today the leading natural gas producer in the Netherlands, with annual production in the region of 59.6 billion mÂł, a figure accounting for around 75% of the total Dutch demand for natural gas. Continuous innovation ensures that both the cost and
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footprint of its operations can constantly be reduced and allows a better understanding of the subsurface, leading to effective use of its existing infrastructure when producing new fields or optimising existing production. Of all of these, NAM’s Groningen field accounts for roughly 70% of its gas production, with the remaining 30% coming from these various smaller fields elsewhere on the Dutch mainland and in the North Sea. NAM is also a significant producer of oil, and accounts for one fifth of that which is
produced in the Netherlands. The foundations of the company were laid on September 19, 1947, following the discovery in 1943 by Exploratie Nederland, a Shell company, of an oil field near Schoonebeek, the development of which required Shell and Esso to form a joint venture: what we know today as Nederlandse Aardolie Maatschappij. Its first natural gas discovery came in Coevorden in 1948, representing the first of its kind in the Netherlands to date. Then came the discovery, just
Nederlandse Aardolie Maatschappij over a decade on in 1959, of the revered Groningen gas field near Slochteren - one of the largest in the world, and with original producible gas reserves of around 2,800 billion m³. It was this discovery which also gave rise to offshore gas exploration and production, and in 1961 NAM became the first company in Western Europe to drill for gas in the North Sea. It has become clear that the Netherlands accounts for some 56% of all natural gas reserves in the European Union and thus plays a key role in the production and transport of natural gas.
THE GRONINGEN FIELD One of the world’s largest gas fields, the Groningen field has a surface area of 900 kilometres squared, and a total production volume of 2,800 billion m³.
“We have long-term contracts with other countries, and that’s also an important point for us”
Historically the field has been the site of 300 wells, drilled across 20 sites, and with the volume of gas produced to date standing at 2,020 billion m³, production is estimated to last for another 50 years. Its discovery in the porous Rotliegend sandstone formation came in July 1959, after two previous unsuccessful wells had been commissioned to search for oil and gas. The field started production in 1963 and initially had the capabilities to produce around 100 billion cubic meters per year in the first decade of production, a figure which gradually fell to around 35 billion cubic meters annually in order to conserve the gas reserves. The gas field plays a crucial role in ensuring that revenues in the country remain healthy, but a growing consensus exists among all parties – and this
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includes gas companies themselves – that the process of gas extraction increases the risk of an earthquake, giving rise to some significant and polarising around its continued employment. Among the thousands of inhabitants who have to cope with the effects of living in the vicinity of the largest gas field in Europe – around 60,000 in number – at least 60% have been affected, resulting in mounting pressure on the government to reduce the extent of the extractions taking place at this site. There is a real and increasingly polarising conflict here, however, due mainly to the sheer importance of the gas which this site provides, as Economics Minister Henk Kamp explains: “Almost all the people heat their houses with Groningen gas and
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they cook their meals with Groningen gas. It’s also important because of the budget of our government.” These are two of the key considerations which have led the scientific recommendations to scale-back the extent of the explorations to be rejected, while as Kamp adds: “We have long-term contracts with other countries, and that’s also an important point for us.” NAM head Bart van de Leemput, summed up the issue neatly to newspaper NRC: “If you realise the Groningen gas fields will still supply us for 50 more years, then there will be more and possibly more severe quakes caused by our gas extraction, but in 20 years’ time we expect there will be fewer.” For the moment, these earthquakes are an extremely undesired but apparently unavoidable side-effect of what is at present, an invaluable
process of extraction. Clearly, there is considerable tension here between the need to maintain such a historically strong energy supply, and the overriding responsibility to protect the interests and wellbeing of the country’s populace: reduced gas extraction cuts the risk of tremors, certainly, but in turn reduces its huge financial significance. The State Supervision of Mines has stated that the production level at Groningen should be cut back to 30 bcm to avoid the risk of more severe quakes, and, while it would be technically possible to do so and still meet domestic demand, the ministry opted for a policy whereby production in 2014 and 2015 would be at 42.5 bcm, and 40 bcm in 2016.
INNOVATION AND UNDERSTANDING Still, it is imperative that NAM utilises its policy of innovation to seek new ways to ensure a continued supply, and central to this is actively exploring for new fields and applying innovative techniques to recover more gas from its existing fields in the Netherlands. The Dutch government’s ‘small fields policy’ has already helped to spare the reserves at the Groningen gas field since 1974, whereby dozens of gas fields have been added to the Dutch gas reserves to capitalise on its own natural gas reserves to the maximum extent possible and to preserve the Groningen gas field as a strategic reserve. NAM has an extremely good understanding of the Dutch subsurface, enabling it to continuously find and produce new fields to secure the Dutch
Uruk Engineering & Contracting Services
STORK ASSET INTEGRITY PARTNER As the leading provider of integrated asset integrity management services, Stork plays an important role in maintaining and upgrading upstream Oil & Gas facilities, including those of Dutch Oil company Nederlandse Aardolie Maatschappij BV (NAM). Stork is partner Stork’s services are tailored to help optimise performance by maintaining, repairing, modifying Besides executing the work with a highly skilled and multi-disciplined workforce, Stork plays an important role as an integrator in both consortia for the engineering and manufacturing partners, ensuring a consistent and world class service delivery. This ability and willingness to With safety always as core value, Stork is committed to continuity, quality, innovation and cost
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energy supply, with its highly modern production facilities designed to have the minimal impact on the environment. The redevelopment of the Schoonebeke oil field, the largest in North-Western Europe, began in January 2009 and comprised 18 new oil extraction locations combined with 73 new wells. NAM has been able to showcase its reliance on new technologies to great effect in this project, producing oil again through a combination of horizontal wells and lowpressure steam injection. As horizontal wells have a much greater contact with the oilbearing rock stratum, more oil can be pumped up from each well. This particular oil is thick and viscous and contains
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a l a r g e q u a n t i t y o f p a r a ff i n , which solidifies at lower t e m p e r a t u re s a n d m u s t b e l i q u e f i e d b e f o re t h e o i l c a n be pumped up, necessitating s t e a m . P ro d u c t i o n b e g a n a t the oilfield, which straddles t h e D u t c h - G e r m a n b o rd e r, i n J a n u a r y 2 0 1 1 , a n d w i l l g ro w t o a ro u n d 2 0 , 0 0 0 b a r re l s p e r d a y, h a v i n g p ro d u c e d a ro u n d 2 5 0 m i l l i o n b a r re l s o f o i l b e f o re b e i n g s h u t d o w n t h ro u g h i t s inability to cover operating costs. Exactly the right combination of technologies w e re re q u i re d t o m a k e t h e re m a i n i n g o i l w o r t h p u r s u i n g , which NAM and its partner Energie Beheer Nederland believed they had put together late in 2007. NAM made best use of new and existing i n f r a s t r u c t u re t o m a n a g e t h e
impact of its operations - a d i s u s e d 1 7 - k i l o m e t re g a s pipeline has been converted t o c a r r y w a s t e w a t e r f ro m t h e p ro c e s s t o d e p l e t e d g a s f i e l d s for permanent storage, while NAM will use another existing pipeline to help deliver the o i l t o a re f i n e r y a c ro s s t h e G e r m a n b o rd e r n e a r b y. S t a t e - o f - t h e - a r t u n d e r g ro u n d gas storage facilities in depleted gas fields at Langelo and Grijpskerk will t o o p l a y s i g n i f i c a n t ro l e s i n s a f e g u a rd i n g e n e r g y s u p p l y in the Netherlands long into t h e f u t u re , e v e n i n t h e m o s t i n c l e m e n t w e a t h e r w h e re demand is at its highest. W h e n t e m p e r a t u re s f a l l a n d consumption rises, these stocks can be drawn upon, a n d t h e n re p l e n i s h e d a t t i m e s
Nederlandse Aardolie Maatschappij o f l o w d e m a n d i n t h e s u m m e r. At both locations, natural g a s i s s t o re d i n t h e p o ro u s sandstone bed of an almost fully drained gas field, and t h e s e f a c i l i t i e s h a v e re p e a t e d l y p ro v e d v i t a l f o r e n s u r i n g energy supplies, as they can deliver extra natural gas at s h o r t n o t i c e a n d e n s u re t h e s u p p l y o f s u ff i c i e n t v o l u m e s o f natural gas to the Netherlands u n d e r a n y c i rc u m s t a n c e s . A l s o k e y t o N A M ’s c o m m i t m e n t t o re c o v e r i n g a s m u c h g a s a s p o s s i b l e , a n d t h u s e n s u re t h e m o s t s u s t a i n a b l e a n d s e c u re energy supply imaginable, is i t s D e n H e l d e r g a s p ro c e s s i n g plant, one of the largest in E u ro p e . The facility processes 19.5 billion m³ of natural gas each year, with its treatment plants
“NAM’s Groningen field accounts for roughly 70% of its gas production”
receiving gas from NAM’s offshore production platforms and carrying out the complex processes which ensure that the gas meets the delivery requirements of Gasunie, a Dutch company that is responsible for transportation via the gas pipeline network in The Netherlands and Germany. Through the Yokogawa revamp of the control systems at the Plant, a move triggered by the difficulty of maintaining the legacy control system due to the scarcity of spare parts, N A M a n t i c i p a t e d i m p ro v e m e n t s i n p ro d u c t i o n performance, system re l i a b i l i t y, a n d m a i n t a i n a b i l i t y, e ff e c t i v e l y e n s u r i n g a s t a b l e gas supply in the Netherlands for years to come via this hugely important facility
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