Oil price keeps outlook upbeat, but don't forget critical challenges

摘要

TO THE AVERAGE energy consumer, the oil and gas industry probably looks like it's sitting on top of the world with nary a dark cloud on its horizon. Oil prices are breaking record highs even as energy demand continues to grow. And all we've got to do is dig holes, pump out the oil and get it to a gas station. How hard can that be? Very hard, considering the declining production from maturing reservoirs. Even harder than that, considering the harsher environments we're moving into (deepwater, ultra-deepwater, HPHT, arctic). And extremely hard, if we want to do it all without safety incidents with an increasing number of new and inexperienced personnel.