Highlights in the Middle East

By Mohammad Ayoub
Operations Leader and Region General Manager, Middle East

GE has been heavily involved in the Middle East oil and gas industry for over 30 years, and we continue investing in the region today – building new advanced facilities to more closely support our customers in their expansion efforts.

By maintaining teams of experienced technicians and advanced local facilities, the benefits couldn't be more clear. For example, we've reduced planned and unplanned shutdown times from weeks to days. And we are increasingly involved in ongoing maintenance and planning operations, working more closely with customer crews. Co-operation is on the rise – and so is plant performance.

Outside of the site-specific technologies and services we provide, another way we support customers is by providing specialized training at our Oil & Gas University in Florence, Italy. Each year, we sponsor a number of talented early career employees form customer organizations across the region – offering a full six-month scholarship.

The program is run by a team of experts and instructors from GE's Oil & Gas business, along with renowned international professionals, and covers a broad range of industry aspects from exploration and production to utilization of the world's various energy sources. It includes four disciplines:

• Leadership: builds management and leadership competencies
• Energy: provides an overall view of the energy industry and its macro-economic models
• Oil and gas processes: introduces and describes industrial processes for the production, transportation, transformation and utilization of oil and gas resources
• Rotating machinery: presents theoretical and basic information on rotating machinery design, operation and maintenance

Students who successfully complete the course and the assigned final project work, are awarded a Certificate in Oil & Gas Technologies.

We also support customers by sharing our best practices in human resources, safety, training, etc – conducting seminars and workshops, and exchanging materials and information.

The sections below offer a glimpse at some of our most recent project highlights. But it's important to point out that they are only the tip of the iceberg. We have long and rewarding relationships with just about every company in the region and we are very proud of this heritage and the successes we've seen together.

Some recent project highlights

GE Oil & Gas continues to expand in the Middle East with over 100 personnel based across three main hubs in Damman, Abu Dhabi and Doha – and over 2,900 units installed to date across the region. Since 1990, GE's PII Pipeline Solutions business has successfully inspected 26,107 km of pipelines in oil, gas, water and refined products lines. Through the recent acquisition of VetcoGray, we have improved the availability of advanced products, systems and services for onshore and offshore drilling and production. We've also established more local manufacturing, service and sales capabilities in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Egypt.

New service and repair center in Qatar
Further increasing its local support for the region’s gas industry, GE Oil & Gas is building a new facility in Ras Laffan Industrial City that will represent a significant GE footprint for the Middle East and act as a service technology hub for customers. Scheduled to open in 2008, the facility will consist of 3.000m² of workshop and 550m² of offices. The shop will provide all size combustion parts repair, rotors repair & balancing up to MS6, and modular replacement up to MS9.

Pipeline integrity management services for Dolphin Energy
GE is providing an integrated package of best-in-class integrity engineering, inspection and data management technology to support the Dolphin Gas Project, which involves the production and processing of natural gas from Qatar’s North Field, and transportation of the dry gas by subsea pipeline to the UAE. A key element of the initial phase of the project is the development of Dolphin’s Pipeline Integrity Management System (PIMS), a demonstration of Dolphin’s commitment to adopting an industry best-practice. The role of PIMS will be to provide the guidelines, standards and procedures that Dolphin will use to ensure the safe and continued operation of its system.

Long-term service agreement with RasGas
GE has signed a six-year pipeline services agreement with RasGas Company in Qatar. GE’s inspection and maintenance expertise for LNG pipelines is being utilized to monitor the 100-km natural gas pipeline from RasGas’ offshore producing facilities to the company’s Train 3 facilities. During the contract period, GE will also guarantee the performance of additional pipelines used in RasGas facilities.

Boosting Qatar to top of global LNG production
GE's Oil & Gas business was among the project vendors cited by RasGas Company Limited for “highly valued contributions” to the recent start-up of LNG train 5 at Ras Laffan Industrial City in Qatar. Train 5, with a production capacity of 4.7 MTPY of LNG, features GE gas turbines and compressors. Trains 6 and 7 are under development and, when complete, will bring the operation's capacity to 77 MTPY – approximately one third of global LNG production capacity. Trains 6 and 7 will use GE's supertrain technology configurations, the same types currently under installation with QatarGas. These trains enable some of the lowest LNG production costs in the world.

Refinery upgrade in the UAE
GE’s Oil & Gas business will supply eight compressors and a steam turbine for the expansion of Emirates National Oil Company’s condensate refinery at Jebel Ali, near Dubai in the UAE. As a result of this project, the output of the existing units at the refinery will be sustained at 120,000 barrels per day of distillates; the upgrade also will enable the refinery to produce high-grade reformate.

Saudi Aramco oil field expansion
Building on a long-standing relationship between our two companies, Saudi Aramco selected GE technology for the Southern Area Seawater Capacity Expansion Project in Ghawar, the world’s largest oil field, and the Khurais oil field. GE will supply 12 mechanical drive packages to increase production. One of our first major installations in the Middle East were Frame 5 mechanical drive gas turbine for Saudi Aramco's water injection applications at the Ghawar field – these are still in operation today. Our latest installation is based on the same Frame 5 technology, but includes all our latest advancements including higher efficiency and low-emission systems.

Compression technology in Oman
GE will supply centrifugal compressors and other equipment for two Petroleum Development Oman projects, one in the Saih Rawl gas field of Central Oman and the other in the Harweel oil field of South Oman. Both projects have strategic importance for Oman’s economy, as they will help secure an uninterrupted gas supply and help to sustain oil production for the country. Oman is also of great importance from a global energy perspective. It has the fastest depleting oil field in the region – so we are employing some of our most leading-edge technologies and our latest, patented materials for compressors handling very sour gas. It's important to watch Harweel because whatever we learn there will help the industry overall.

Gas turbines for liquefied gas
GE is supplying three Frame 6B gas turbines to provide about 120 MW of power for Qatar Liquefied Gas Company's LNG production facilities 2, 3 and 4 in Ras Laffan, Qatar. The new machines expand our fleet in Qatar, which includes Frame 5, 6, 7 and 9 gas turbines and our supertrain technologies.

VetcoGray selected for RasGas North Field
GE's VetcoGray business has been established as a vendor of choice since 2001, supplying large bore and high volume gas production trees for the world’s second largest non-associated gas field, North Field, in Qatar. The trees are being manufactured at our state-of-the-art Singapore facility, which is also providing engineering and project management support.

Providing sour gas production equipment for ADCO Sour Gas
VetcoGray supplied the first wellhead and christmas tree for the ADCO Sour Gas project onshore in Abu Dhabi. This equipment was manufactured in Singapore to the highest industry standards using exotic and very corrosion-resistant materials. Key elements of this contract were delivery speed, engineering, materials properties and high-temperature capabilities.

Sole Supplier of Khuff Gas Completion for Saudi Aramco
Since the start of the Khuff Gas Drilling in Saudi Arabia, VetcoGray has been selected as the Sole Supplier by Saudi Aramco to supply the Critical Completion components, metal-to-metal production casing seals, tubing spool, tubing hanger and block lower master valve for all Khuff Gas Wells. This equipment is made to exacting standards and has exhibited excellent performance with no field failure or reported downtime.

Other recent localization initiatives in the Middle East

GE's Oil & Gas business has formed a joint venture with GAMCO called Gulf Turbine Services, located in Mussafah (Industrial City) in Abu Dhabi. Established in 2001, this facility offers a broad range of compressor and turbine services along with access to worldwide resources to meet regional customers’ specific needs.

In 2005, we signed an agreement to support the development of a specialized laboratory in the Department of Engineering at the Petroleum Institute in Abu Dhabi.

We are also involved at the Qatar Science & Technology Park with the GE Technology and Learning Center for aviation and energy customers, as well as research and development for oil, gas and water customers across the region. And we have partnered with Gasco to establish the Pipeline Integrity Management Center of Excellence in Cairo, Egypt - the first of its kind in the Middle East.

We continually support the development of our customers’ staff, providing dedicated technical training – training more than 350 local technicians in the last six months, mainly in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait. Our extensive local recruitment and training program continues with much success and many talented recruits.

With everything that is changing in this industry, our commitment to our Middle East customers remains steadfast.

For more information on GE Oil & Gas in the Middle East please contact:

Katrina Talucod
Katrina.Talucod@ge.com