Providing environmental, regulatory, and technical consultancy services to clients in oil and gas, ensuring compliant permitting, responsible decommissioning, and smooth transition to low carbon solutions through expert assessments, modelling, and specialist support.
Navigating Complex Challenges in the Oil and Gas Sector
The oil and gas industry faces unique challenges, particularly as reserves deplete and product demand shifts, whilst also preparing for a low-carbon future. A key focus is managing the decommissioning and repurposing of aging assets, a growing concern for industry operators.
Permitting and Consenting
Intertek Metoc have a 40-year track-record permitting oil and gas operations in the North Sea/UK Continental Shelf and overseas, having secured over750 offshore permits. The permitting and consenting of oil and gas operations is essential for providing clear environmental evidence alongside vital documentation and alignment with regulatory bodies.
Oil and gas operators are facing increased pressure to demonstrate compliance and transparency whilst maintaining the expectations for sustainability and decarbonisation. Intertek Metoc play a critical role in assisting clients through these requirements, whether that’s through technical support, delivering environmental assessments or providing regulatory insight, ensuring compliance throughout the operations life cycle.
Intertek Metoc provide support for oil and gas operators for regulatory compliance for the following:
- Decommissioning studies (comparative assessment, input into decommissioning plans, and permitting)
- Permitting via the UK Energy Portal Environmental Tracking System (PETS)
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- Environmental & chemical permits for drilling (inc. CCUS), well intervention, and well abandonment
- Pipeline environmental permits (installation & commissioning, operation, maintenance, decommissioning) and for marine surveys
- Environmental impact assessment & statements for new field through to decommissioning
- Risk-based assessment (produced water discharges)
- Metocean, environmental & sediment / scour modelling
- Seabed survey design, management and QC
- Oil Pollution Emergency Plans (OPEPs)
- Bird management plans
- GHG emissions assessment & certification through Intertek CarbonClear programme and accredited auditor for the MiQ methane emissions standard
- Substitution and technical justification reporting in compliance with OSPAR requirements
- Modelling support for discharge scenarios
Decommissioning and Carbon Capture, Utilisation and Storage
Decommissioning activities are accelerating across the UKCS, requiring complex environmental, operational, and regulatory demands. On top of this, the industry is beginning to reshape its capabilities to support emerging solutions to Net Zero through innovations such as Carbon Capture, Utilisation and Storage (CCUS). In this shifting landscape, environmental services play a key role in ensuring that decommissioning and the subsequent transition towards CCUS operations is delivered responsibly and in full compliance with regulatory bodies.
Seabird Management
Seabirds can be a big concern for offshore operators, causing ecologically complex situations.
For offshore development or decommissioning, Intertek Metoc has provided assistance to operators and developers to ensure regulatory compliance whilst protecting ornithological features. Intertek Metoc have provided permitting support for:
- Environmental Appraisals, Decommissioning Plans, and Marine Licence Applications
- pioneering deterrence trials to prevent nesting on offshore assets
- Disturbance licences for seabird tracking and population monitoring studies
- Innovative methodologies to assess disturbance and cumulative impacts
- Tailored Bird Management Plans that support sustainable operations
Ecological Management and Imagery Analysis
Meteorological & Oceanographic (Metocean) Services