28/04/2021

Offshore decommissioning: Zeroing in on trends and challenges

Decommissioning of offshore assets has been high on the energy industry’s agenda for some years. This high-tech, high-cost challenge raises a host of difficult legal and policy issues. We last examined the legal framework in our 2016 bulletin, End of Shelf Life.

Since then, sustained low oil prices and ever-increasing policy emphasis on climate change have made this an ever more complex area for owners and operators of assets, specialist contractors, governments and regulators globally.

This bulletin is the first in a series of publications and events from Twenty Essex focusing on developments in this area, aimed at helping players in the sector and their advisers navigate the constantly shifting legal terrain. In this bulletin, we cover:

• The major recent trends affecting decommissioning.
• The evolving regulatory framework for decommissioning on the UK Continental Shelf (UKCS) as it sets itself the awkward objective of both maximising economic recovery of petroleum and furthering the UK government’s decarbonisation aims.
• How the ‘Net Zero’ target impacts decommissioning.
• Potential legal challenges arising out of the newly updated Oil & Gas Authority (OGA) Strategy.

Read the full article (PDF, 544KB)

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