Welcome back to another episode! This week’s episode is our First Friday Q&A for March. You ask the questions and we answer them. Big thanks to everyone who wrote in. If you want to get a question answered for next month’s FFQA, click the link below. Enjoy!
Have a question? Click here to ask.
 
Show Notes & Links:

Questions:
 

What is your take on the recent success of the Utah lease sale?
Are the operators entering this field taking a gamble in hopes of hitting large undiscovered reserves, or is this a legitimate play in a field that was previously inaccessible?

Thanks for hosting such a great show and helping young geologists such as myself Lear about other aspects of the industry I have not been exposed to yet! My question is; with China constructing these artificial islands in the South China Sea and attempting to take control of more maritime land, do you think this is partly motivated by prospective oil and gas prospects in the South China Sea and how do you think this will affect exploration efforts in the area? 

What do you think the next year holds for the SCOOP? Continental and Gulfport are both down there, but I haven’t seen production data from very many wells. A couple years ago it seemed like the SCOOP and STACK plays were the up and coming darlings of US land, Density looks to have increased in the STACK but the SCOOP has been mostly quiet as far as I can tell. 

I am a chemical engineer working for an independent refiner and am concerned with how the public perception of the energy industry may affect the long-term viability of refining in the United States.
Recent examples include:

* Valero barred from buying California terminals for 10 years
* Tesoro denied Vancouver Energy Terminal
* Washington State denying Shell crude by rail project
* Significant opposition to Phillips 66 Rodeo Refinery marine terminal proposal (more crude by ship)

It seems like a lot of opposition to anything oil stems from an overly simplistic view that all things oil & gas are bad and should be opposed. I used to be part of the problem. When I was a freshman in college, I told a friend that I could never work for an oil company as it would be immoral. I thought this way until we visited a refinery as part of a class trip and realized how ignorant I was.
How can we, as an industry and individuals, help steer the conversation and restore the image of the industry so the public at large better understands how much of a net benefit oil & gas is to society? Furthermore, what should our industry be focusing on to enhance our environmental performance and display our stewardship for the environment?.
Finally, there seems to be pressure on large investment funds to divest from oil & gas. Is there any information that an independent refiner (or upstream company) should be providing to the investment community so they better understand environmental performance? Should there be a standard environmental metric like we have for personal and process safety (e.g., OSHA recordable incident rate, API tier 1/2)?

I really love the podcast, thanks for this show and all of the others under OGGN. 2 questions:

Are you bringing back the Oil and Gas Careers show..? If so when?
Do you have any tips or techniques for interviewing in Oil and Gas, specifically the service companies?

Can you and Jake each answer this please? I always like comparing how you two come at things in different ways. Keep you the great work!

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As of 04/10/2018 – The American Rig count is 1088 active rigs.
 
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