The anticipation of an upcoming media trip to Hammerfest, Norway, got this editor to thinking about a few things.
First, "gratitude" came to mind. I am grateful for working for such a well-respected oil and gas industry trade magazine and for some of the amazing opportunities, such as this one, afforded by that privilege.
My second thought would have to be "fellowship." I definitely feel a kinship with other OGJ editors—past and present—who have made such trips around the globe, all in the name of waving the OGJ flag and reflecting the experience back to OGJ readers upon their return home.
It's been said that travel changes people, opening up new worlds to them. Travel also expands one's understanding of that world and the people who inhabit it.
In fact, when asking Chief Editor-Exploration Alan Petzet for some guidance on this travel-based column, he recalled some past columns written by Randy Sumpter, a former OGJ Gulf Coast news editor, who wrote at least one Journally Speaking on the topic of travel. Alan then produced a copy of one of Randy's columns dated May 21, 1979, entitled, "How to learn a territory."
In it, Randy describes taking a 250-mile road trip one Sunday with a fellow Journal editor that looped from Houston through Beaumont, Port Arthur, Galveston, and back again. Randy took this trip just to see and better-understand his newly assigned coverage territory.
Of course, I'm overstepping some boundaries in this space. After all, guidance for writing this column appearing at the bottom of an OGJ assignments document offers this little piece of helpful advice: "While trips can provide good Journally Speaking material, don't write travelogues."
But since I'm yet to take this particular excursion, I don't see as how writing about it now could possibly be misconstrued as a travelogue, do you?
Expected takeaways
The primary purpose of this media junket, which is being generously hosted by Zurich-based ABB Group, is to be taken on a guided tour of Statoil's Hammerfest LNG exporting facility on Melkoya island.
The Hammerfest plant, which gets its gas from the Snohvit development in the Barents Sea, is the world's first LNG plant with carbon capture and storage.
ABB's invitation letter said, "One of the last frontiers of the oil and gas industry is the Arctic region, which holds 25% of the remaining oil and gas reserves worldwide." The Arctic region, the letter continues, offers numerous challenges to producers not the least of which is "icy, inaccessible areas in tundra far away from land."
ABB said, "The industry is pushing technology to its limits, ensuring extraction happens in a safe, efficient, and environmentally friendly way" that coexists with fisheries and indigenous people, who want to maintain a traditional lifestyle, a clean sea, and healthy migratory animals such as reindeer and caribou.
"Technologies such as power from shore and carbon capture and storage are now becoming viable, regularly applied solutions in this part of the world," ABB said. "Moving into colder and deeper water will also require future sophisticated subsea solutions," it said.
Expect the unexpected
With a trip like this one—in such a remote northern location—I personally think it might be best to go into the experience with a mindset to expect the unexpected. Traveling in general, afterall, especially with such a change in longitude and latitude, is not always convenient or comfortable.
And since the host's agenda covers a mere 3 days next week, the length of the trip itself won't even give this weary editor time enough to adjust to jet lag.
I have no doubt that regardless of what happens, I'll return with a changed perspective on the world in which the oil and gas industry operates and a newfound knowledge of some pretty remote territory.
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