Legal Support Services

Our work in this area has focused on developing technical expert witness report s and as acting as technical expert witness. Several of these assignments have required the deployment of our INTEGRATED team of oil and gas consultants to provide expert testimony in reserves, license and other technical disputes.Below are details of the consulting work carried out in this area.

Project Experience

The projects below have required deployment of Legal Support Services skill set: 

Petroleum Expert Witness Report - License Dispute

Developed a Petroleum Expert Witness report and acted as an expert witness during arbitration proceeding with respect to a disputed unitisation claim affecting two adjacent licenses onshore western Siberia. As pert of the work made a retrospective assessment of reserves as the basis for testing the compensation claim of one of the parties to the dispute.

Petroleum Expert Witness Report - Two Oil Fields

Developed a petroleum expert witness report as part of a dispute centred on conflicting claims over production practices adopted and schedule delays associated with a redevelopment of these fields in Azerbaijan.

These two medium sized onshore oil fields, developed in soviet times but taken over by western investors. The report included an independent assessment of reserves, production profile and levels of investment required to develop the fields to their full potential. The assessment was based on a detailed review of production and other data gathered in Soviet times up to the time of the dispute.  

Technical Expert Witness Report - Canada

Developed a technical expert witness report designed to establish the suitablity of a production vessel, originally designed for use in the UKCS, for Canadian waters. The brief was to establish if there where insurmontable technical difficulties in deploying a vessel, originally designed for the severe weather conditions of the North Sea, in the ice-infested and potentailly frozen waters offshore Newfoundland. The conclusion of the report was the whislt all technical difficulties could be overcome the cost impact of making the canges to the particular vessels would be severe.

Petroleum Expert Witness Report - Heavy Oil Field

Developed a field development plan for this field in Kazakhstan which contained heavy very viscous oil. The reservoirs associated with the field are shallow lying and are primarily shallow marine sandstones.

This included a geological, and reservoir engineering assessment to determine the optimum production method and the producible reserves associated with the field. Fully developed a field development plan for a scheme utilising steam injection on a 5 spot pattern to produce the field.

As part of the work developed a reservoir model and a full subsurface and surface development plan, generated development and operating costs using our NETCO$TER cost Evaluation Software also carried out a valuation. 

The assessment was used by the expert witness for the defence under a claim pursued under UNCITRAL rules at the Arbitration Institute of the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce.