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Manama, Kingdom of Bahrain -- Scores of officials and experts and key stakeholders from the Gulf and global heavy oil producing countries will gather in Manama, Bahrain on November 25-26 for the Middle East Heavy Oil Congress (MEHOC) a forum that will provide a platform for discussion and debate of the latest business issues and technologies of the heavy oil industry.
The Congress and Exhibition at The Gulf Hotel will be held under the patronage of His Excellency Dr Abdul Hussain bin Ali Mirza, Bahrain's Minister of Energy and Chairman of the National Oil and Gas Authority (NOGA).
"As the energy sector is increasingly turning to the exploitation and conversion of their conventional heavy oil resources, the Middle East Heavy Oil Congress provides the perfect regional gathering for the industry to discuss what innovative trends and transformations will define the future of this upcoming sector. On behalf of NOGA, we look forward to welcoming you all to the Kingdom of Bahrain this November", said Dr Ahmed Al Sharyan, General Secretary of the National Oil & Gas Authority (NOGA).
Organisers, DMG Global Energy said the event provides "the perfect platform" for global and regional experts involved in both the upstream and downstream heavy oil sector to share knowledge, review new technologies and discuss business opportunities and challenges with the leading companies involved in this fast evolving sector.
MEHOC will include topics such as evaluating a holistic approach to extending the reservoir lifecycle, emerging technologies to maximise performance with minimum environmental impact, and technical heavy oil case studies from across the globe.
Companies which have already confirmed their participation include NOGA, BAPCO, TATWEER PETROLEUM, SAUDI ARAMCO, KUWAIT OIL COMPANY, GLASSPOINT SOLAR, PETROSPEC ENGINEERING, PROMORE, INNOVATIVE STEAM TECHNOLOGIES, NALCO CHAMPION, SATORP, PETROCHINA, KUWAIT INSTITUTE OF SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH AND STREAMFLO.
In an interview with MEHOC ahead of the congress, a senior Kuwaiti Oil company (KOC) official said the company has been locked in projects to develop heavy oil resources. Emad Sultan, Deputy CEO, KOC North said the KOC 2030 strategy has envisioned the development of heavy oil resources in two phases.
Phase I, also known as "Building capability" phase, aims to establish heavy oil production to build strategic capability to produce 60 MBOPD of heavy oil starting from 2018/19 and maintained afterward.
He said Phase II aims to grow heavy oil production to higher rates to contribute in achieving Kuwait's target capacity of 4 MMstbo by 2020, and further increase heavy oil production by 2025.
In another interview, an official at Bapco spoke about Bahrain's refinery Fluid Catalytic
Cracking Unit (FCCU), which he said had an output capacity of 18 mbpd before it was raised to 30 mbpd in 1953. "Capacity was increased in the following 10 years to 36 mbpd in mid 1960s before it was boosted to 43 mbpd by early 2000", said Chandra Sekhar, process specialist at Bapco.
Mr. Sekhar said he would talk in his speech at MEHOC about the how the FCCU was revamped to process heavy oil, with modest investment, and how the project has been extremely successful, with a great return on investment.
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© Press Release 2015
