New challenges of the Oil & Gas Industry

With rising global demand, highly volatile prices and increasingly stringent environmental regulations, the oil and gas industry faces three major challenges : reduce costs, optimize the performance of its industrial base assets and improve its environmental footprint.

Three major challenges for the oil & gas industry

> Reducing costs to remain competitive

Producing crude oil and refined products at a lower cost to stay competitive on the market is one of the industry’s major challenges. Optimizing production systems and environmental utilities on currently operating sites is therefore a priority for the oil industry. This maximizes production efficiency, reduces the costs of extraction and refining and thereby offsets the exploration costs.

 

> Improving performance to ensure the valorization of assets 

To sustain their supply of crude oil or gas, oil companies are looking to extend the life of mature sites but are also compelledto seek new sources of oil or gas for which extraction, transport and refining are much more complex and costly. For that, they aim to achieve 100% reliability of their plants : no unplanned shutdowns , increased throughput , secure industrial assets.
 

> Improving the Environmental footprint to meet increasingly stringent standard

The oil and gas industry is a major consumer of water and energy resources and is therefore subject to increasingly stringent environmental standards. This constrains them to rethink extraction, production and distribution methods in order to obtain or maintain their licence to operate.
They also have to provide guarantees and ensure transparency in the environmental management of their activities.

In the Beijing area in China for example, where water shortages are becoming more frequent and where tackling air pollution is a major central government commitment, environmental standards are particularly strict. The standards governing wastewater discharges in particular are currently the most demanding in the world. This is a major compliance challenge for the industrial groups in the region, in particular for Sinopec. It is the largest refining company in Asia and operates the Beijing Yanshan petrochemical complex, one of the largest refined petroleum products production sites in the country.

Veolia's solutions for the oil & gas and industry

The range of offers focuses on the needs of both upstream (exploration and production) and downstream customers (refining and petrochemicals) in the oil and gas industry.

Upstream, Veolia builds and operates treatment systems for injection water and water producedproduced water, offers mobile water treatment solutions, manages waste (including hazardous waste), decommissions platforms, and offers a range of services tailored to the specific needs of the sector.

Downstream, the Group treats process water, wastewater, and cooling water, provides surface treatment and automated cleaning services, treats hazardous waste, produces steam and electricity, optimizes energy efficiency in facilities and recovers products such as solvents, oily sludge, etc.
 

Managing the life cycle of oil companies’ resources

Water is central to all activities of the oil and gas industry. As a leading expert in water management, Veolia controls all the stages of the water cycle and can address all industrial challenges, thanks to a portfolio of more than 350 proprietary technologies.
 
Resource management, production and delivery of process water, collection, treatment, recycling and recovery of wastewater, effluent and products derived from their treatment (organic matter, salts, metals, complex molecules and energy), desalination of seawater, design and construction of treatment and network structures: all these skills allow Veolia to support the oil industry in the development of an integrated and sustainable management of water resources. 
 
Veolia also offers solutions for the management of hazardous waste, recycling by-products, industrial services, decommissioning and soil remediation.
 
Veolia’s expertise in water, energy and waste management allows the Group to be the world leader in the provision of environmental services for the oil and gas industry.

 

  • VEOLIA’S MBBR ANOXKALDNES™ TECHNOLOGY 

The MBBR AnoxKaldnes™ technology is based on the principle of active biofilm growing on small plastic carriers, especially designed and kept suspended in the reactor.

 

  • VEOLIA’S ACTIFLO® CARB TECHNOLOGY 

ACTIFLO® is a compact process for high rate clarification, and an ideal solution for producing process water, treating industrial effluent, and recycling it to the production sites. 

 

 

  • ZÉRO LIQUID DISCHARGE

Regulatory thresholds for liquid waste and sewage effluent are becoming stricter. In terms of efficiency and innovation, the complete management of the water cycle for industrial applications aims to reach zero liquid discharge (ZLD). l’objectif zéro rejet liquide (ZRL). 

 

 

  • TANK CLEANING WITH THE GATOR ROBOT

 Even under optimal circumstances, oil tank cleaning can be risky. There in lies the added value of the Gator robot and related services.

 

 

For our oil & gas industry references, see HERE