Bandar Seri Begawan - The Permanent Secretary (Upstream) at the Prime Minister's Office, Awg Hj Azhar Hj Yahya yesterday witnessed the official opening of the new Shell Deepwater Borneo Ltd (SDB) premises at the PGGMB Building in the capital.

The event began with a mass recital ofSurah al-Fatihah and a Doa Selamat read by Imam Hj Burhannudin. A brief welcoming speech was then given by the Managing Director of SDB, Simon Eaton.

The ribbon cutting ceremony for the new office was officiated by the guest of honour, Dr Ceri Powell, Executive Vice President for Exploration at Royal Dutch Shell plc, and Awg Hj Azhar.

In her speech prior to the opening, Dr Powell noted that Shell has been involved in Brunei for more than 75 years and the nation has been instrumental in building the Royal Dutch Shell pride into the company.

The newly opened office in the capital features quality fit-out, high-end IT infrastructure and exciting exploration programmes to allow amazing employee value proposition, particularly for the local staff.

"We have an aspiration to 'do more' and great hopes for the future, to build further businesses and grow a generation of new talents in Brunei," said Dr Powell. She also noted that SDB was acquired by Shell in 2002 as an expansion of its upstream commitment to Brunei's Oil and Gas industry.

"A 35 per cent partnership with TOTAL and Petroleum Brunei (PB) in Maharaja Lela Field has been contributing to Brunei's gas exports through BLNG since 1998 and is now embarking on a significant incremental development in ML-South to bring on additional reserves and boost production from 2015 onwards."

She added that SDB is also investing in Brunei's deep water exploration through its interests in the CA2 venture operated by Petronas in which they support the operator through bringing Shell's global deepwater experience to Brunei.

"Through these partnerships, Shell is actively involved in diversifying and expanding upstream business development in Brunei."

Shell was delighted to have its Operatorship of Block A renewed with partner Petroleum Brunei on September 19, and SDB is committed to bringing latest seismic acquisition and processing technologies to bare.

"Our intention is not only to participate in the BroadSeis acquisition campaign but to add multi azimuth swaths to the programme, specifically in Block A, to help unlock remaining exploration potential in new, challenging, more complex and previously unexplored parts of the subsurface, with a view to drilling the first exploration well by 2015."

Dr Powell further highlighted that SDB is also looking at low cost, innovative development scenarios to potentially commercialise existing small undeveloped gas discovery ( Juragan), and this will require collaborative solutions with the existing Brunei Shell infrastructure operator BSP in what would be a new commercial model between ventures not previously seen here.

The CEO of Shell, Peter Voser, has a vision of Shell as the most innovative and competitive energy company, and it is through seeing the geology through new eyes, enabled by state-of-the-art technology and effective partnerships that they, as explorers hunting those first oil and gas successes, can play their part in achieving the vision.

Also at the opening were the Chief Executive Officer of Brunei National Petroleum Company Sdn Bhd, Dato Paduka Awg Hj Matsatejo Sokiaw and other senior representatives in the oil and gas industry.

--Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin