Siccar Point Energy

Background

Siccar Point Energy is an oil and gas company based in Aberdeen that carries out exploration, development and production. According to its website, the company is “focussed on high quality, low cost, long life assets on the UK Continental Shelf”. [1], [2]

As of July 2021, the company has an interest in 24 North Sea licences and is backed by private equity firms BlueWaterEnergy and Blackstone Energy Partners. [3], [4]

Siccar Point has stakes in six projects including Rosebank, one of the UK’s largest undeveloped fields, and claims to have assets that “will produce through to the 2050s”. [5]

In 2021, Siccar Point Energy requested permission from the UK’s Oil and Gas Authority (OGA) to develop a new oil and gas field off the coast of Shetland with its partner Shell. [6], [7]

An exploration licence for the field was issued in 2001, and the Cambo field is expected to produce oil and gas until 2050, with oil production expected to begin in 2025. [8]

Cambo would be one of the most significant new UK oil and gas developments to go ahead since the International Energy Agency (IEA) announced in May 2021 that no new oil, gas, or coal projects could be developed if the world is to meet its target of net zero emissions by 2050. [9]

Petrofac, an oilfield services firm under investigation by the Serious Fraud Office (SFO), as of August 2021, for allegedly paying million-pound bribes to secure contracts in nine different countries, has been contracted by Siccar Point Energy to operate its wells and manage the engineering for the oil and gas firm’s assets in the North Sea since 2019. [16], [17]

Petrofac’s co-founder Ayman Asfari has, along with his wife, donated almost £900,000 to the Conservative Party. [18]

Stance on Climate Change

Siccar Point claims to make “care for the environment” a “fundamental principle of our business”. According to its Health, Safety and Environmental policy, the company seeks to “reduce and mitigate permitted, unplanned and fugitive emissions and waste in our operations and in our design and construction of new wells and facilities”. [10]

Siccar Point’s Environmental, Social & Governance page says the company is committed to “producing oil and gas responsibly” and “providing a secure home-grown energy supply in support of UK Net Zero and energy transition goals”. [11]

Regarding its closely-watched Cambo development, Siccar Point claims that the project is “being engineered in compliance with all EU and UK emissions and waste management regulations and directives” and will use well construction methods that “reduce emissions from drilling operations”. The company also claims that the field’s design “minimises routine flaring and venting and reduces carbon and methane intensity as far as practicable”. [11]

Key People

Jonathan Roger is the CEO of Siccar Point Energy. Roger started his career with US oil company Conoco and later worked for Centrica, before leaving in 2013 to found a “new Private Equity backed business focused on the North Sea,” resulting in Siccar Point. [12]

Actions

July 4, 2022

Siccar Point Energy was officially acquired by Ithaca Energy, which had announced in April 2022 that it would pay at least £1.1 billion for the company. Due to the acquisition, Ithaca Energy received stakes in the Cambo and Rosebank fields, two of the largest undeveloped fields in the UK North Sea. [20]

December 2, 2021

Despite pausing the development of the Cambo oil and gas field, Siccar Point Energy stated that it would continue to engage with stakeholders and the UK government on the future of the project. [19]

CEO Jonathan Roger said that “Cambo remains critical to the U.K’s energy security and economy,” adding that the project “will not only create over 1,000 direct jobs (as well as thousands more in the supply chain), but also help ease the U.K.’s transition to a low-carbon future.” [19]

July 19, 2021

A dozen activists protested against Siccar Point’s proposed Cambo oil and gas field inside a UK government building in Edinburgh in the hope that the development would not go ahead. [13]

Siccar Point CEO Jonathan Roger said in response to the Stop Cambo campaign: “We respect people’s right to engage in dialogue, and to express their feelings and opinions in a safe and peaceful way.

“We have undertaken extensive consultation on the development, as rightly expected by Government, regulatory and public stakeholders.

“We are committed to developing Cambo in a responsible manner which helps the UK meet its net-zero targets.

“The majority of the UK’s energy needs are currently met by oil and gas and the Climate Change Committee and International Energy Agency have said that the UK will still need oil and gas for decades to come as part of the energy transition.”

Roger added that the Cambo development would “secure UK supply rather than rely on imports from less regulated countries, whilst creating more than 1,000 direct UK jobs and thousands more in the supply chain,” and said that the development “has been designed to reduce emissions from the outset and will be built ‘electrification’ ready with the potential to import renewable power when it becomes feasible in the future.” [13]

June 7, 2021

Siccar Point Energy announced plans to launch the Cambo oil project in the West of Shetland. [6]

Cambo is expected to have a lifespan of 25 years, bringing the termination date of the project to 2050, the year the UK has pledged to achieve net zero emissions. The public consultation period for the project ended on July 10, 2021. [7]

According to the company’s environmental impact assessment for the Cambo development, the “worst-case scenario” amount of carbon emissions generated by the project over its lifespan “during operations from fuel gas use, flaring and diesel use” is “estimated to be 3,451,597 tonnes of CO2 equivalents”. The company added that this estimate “does not take into account any potential future mitigation measures that may be introduced over the life of [the] field, such as electrification of the Cambo FPSO, in support of the overall government aim of net zero by 2050”.

The company added that “although neither technically nor economically viable from the outset at the start of production,” the development “has been designed to accommodate the installation of a future electrical infrastructure to facilitate electrical power” for the project’s infrastructure. [14]

Oil & Gas UK – Siccar Point Energy is a member of OGUK. [15]
Petrofac [17]

Contact & Address

According to its website, Siccar Point Energy can be reached at the following address: [1]

3rd Floor, H1
Hill of Rubislaw
Anderson Drive
Aberdeen
AB15 6BY

Siccar Point Energy does not appear to be active on social media.

Resources

“Contact us,” Siccar Point Energy. Archived July 26, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/lmk6o
“Our strategy,” Siccar Point Energy. Archived July 26, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/kGYJO
“Who Owns the North Sea?,” Common Wealth, July 2021. Archived July 28, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/Ar0Ag
“Institutional investors,” Siccar Point Energy. Archived July 26, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/pCzCF
Laura Hurst and Dinesh Nair. “North Sea producer Siccar Point receives multiple buyout offers,” World Oil, January 21, 2020. Archived July 26, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/F2ccv
Nick Coleman. “UK’s Siccar Point unveils plans for Cambo heavy crude field,” S&P Global, June 8, 2021. Archived July 26, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/Y8Ep5
“Public Notice: The Offshore Oil and Gas Exploration, Production, Unloading and Storage (Environmental Impact Assessment) Regulations 2020 (PDF),” Siccar Point Energy, June 7, 2021. Archived .pdf on file at DeSmog.
Emma Snaith. “‘Completely indefensible’: Anger as green groups urge government to reject plans for new oil field,” The Independent, July 19, 2021. Archived July 26, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/Y6SWZ
Fiona Harvey. “No new oil, gas or coal development if world is to reach net zero by 2050, says world energy body,” The Guardian, May 18, 2021. Archived July 26, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/EvxGL
“Policies,” Siccar Point Energy, 2020. Archived July 26, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/Gnb2L
“Environmental, Social & Governance,” Siccar Point Energy. Archived July 26, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/KehUl
“Jonathan Roger,” Siccar Point Energy. Archived July 29, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/tQV6p
Mark Lammey. “Cambo oilfield protestors occupy UK Government building in Edinburgh,” Energy Voice, July 19, 2021. Archived July 20, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/o6Bn1
“Cambo Oil Field, UKCS Blocks 204/4a, 204/5a, 204/9a and 204/10a Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA),” Siccar Point Energy, June 7, 2021. Archived.pdf on file at DeSmog.
“Operators directory,” Oil and Gas UK. Archived on July 27, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/TLFyk
Serious Fraud Office. “Petrofac Ltd.,” May 17, 2021. Archived July 21, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/Vgc34
Mark Lammey. “Updated: Petrofac bags £73.5m well services deal with Siccar Point,” Energy Voice, February 11, 2019. Archived August 25, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/quuIR
Electoral Commission. “Search: asfari,” August 25, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/41P56
Laura Hurst. “Shell Ditches U.K. Oil Project in Win for Climate Activists,” Bloomberg Green, December 2, 2021. Archived December 15, 2021. Archive URL: https://archive.ph/IOeYg
“Ithaca Energy Wraps Siccar Point Energy Buy,” Offshore Engineer, July 4, 2022. Archived July 6, 2022. Archive URL: https://archive.ph/MjjOG

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