Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Tulsa, 1991. / Bibliography: leaves 228-233.

Thesis (Professional Degree)--University of Missouri, School of Mines and Metallurgy, 1925. / Three folded maps in separate container. The entire thesis text is included in file. Typescript. Title from title screen of thesis/dissertation PDF file (viewed October 26, 2009) Includes index (p. [80-81]).

Thesis (M.S.)--Ohio University, March, 2007. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references.

A presente pesquisa objetivou investigar a relevância das informações relacionadas às reservas provadas de petróleo e das informações contábeis (lucro e patrimônio líquido) divulgadas por empresas petrolíferas. Por meio de um estudo de value relevance aplicado ao setor petrolífero mundial, o problema de pesquisa desta tese foi traduzido na seguinte questão: qual a relevância das informações relacionadas às reservas provadas de petróleo e das informações contábeis (lucro e patrimônio líquido) divulgadas por petrolíferas integradas e listadas na Bolsa de Valores de Nova Iorque (New York Stock Exchange - NYSE), durante o período de 2001 a 2012? Para responder a essa questão e atingir o objetivo proposto, foram aplicadas regressões considerando a técnica de Dados em Painel em uma amostra composta por 15 petrolíferas, cada uma com observações para os 12 anos pesquisados, totalizando 180 empresas-ano. Foram testados 8 modelos, todos tendo como variável dependente o logaritmo neperiano ou natural (ln) do preço médio das ações, considerando os preços de fechamento dos meses de novembro, dezembro, janeiro e fevereiro. Como variáveis explicativas foram testadas o Patrimônio Líquido (PL), o Lucro Líquido (LL), os Custos Capitalizados (CC), o Volume de Reservas de Óleo e Gás (RPO&G), suas alterações e o Fluxo de Caixa Futuro Descontado (FCD) decorrente dessas reservas. Os resultados mostraram que as informações sobre o PL são mais relevantes do que as informações sobre os resultados (LL). As informações sobre os Custos Capitalizados são relevantes e com forte relação inversa (negativa) com os preços das ações. Fraca relevância das informações sobre o volume das Reservas Provadas de Petróleo e do Fluxo de Caixa Futuro Descontado relativo a essas reservas. Quando desagregados em seus componentes principais (revisões, melhorias de recuperação, descobertas, compras, vendas e produção) a informação sobre o volume das reservas ganharam relevância. Especificamente, observou-se considerável relevância das informações sobre descobertas, produção e compra de petróleo. Por fim, os resultados indicaram que o valor de mercado de uma petrolífera é função da variável contábil PL e de informações relacionadas às reservas provadas de petróleo e de gás. Esse achado reforça a ideia de que os dados contábeis são informações incompletas para a determinação do valor de uma petrolífera, sendo que as informações relacionadas às reservas provadas de petróleo e de gás contribuem incrementando a relevância das variáveis contábeis mensuradas a valores históricos. Em decorrência disso, informações adicionais em notas explicativas sobre as reservas de petróleo são relevantes e necessárias, além das tradicionais já divulgadas nas demonstrações financeiras. / This actual research investigated the relevance of information related to proven reserves of oil and accounting information (net income and book value) disclosed by oil companies. Thus, by means of a value relevance study applied to the global petroleum industry, the following question resulted from the research problem: What relevance does information related to proven reserves of oil and accounting information (net income and book value) disclosed by integrated oil companies that are listed on the stock exchange in New York (New York Stock Exchange - NYSE), during the period 2001-2012, have? To answer this question and achieve the proposed objective there were applied panel data regressions in a sample of 15 oil companies, each company with observations for 12 years, totaling 180 observations. There have been tested 8 models, each of them having as dependent variable the Naperian or natural logarithm (ln) of the average share price, considering the closing prices of November, December, January and February. As independent variables have been tested book value (PL), net income (LL), capitalized costs (CC), volume of gas and oil reserves (RPO&G), components of the change in reserve value, discounted future cash flow (FCD) of the reserves. The results revealed that the information about PL is more relevant than the information about LL. The information about the capitalized costs is relevant, with a strong inverse negative relationship with the share prices. Further, the results demonstrated a weak relevance of information on the volume of gas and oil reserves and the discounted future cash flow of the reserves. When broken down into its main components (reviews, recovery improvements, discoveries, purchases, sales and production), the information about volume of gas and oil reserves gained in relevance. Specifically, there has been observed a considerable relevance of information about discoveries, production and the purchases of oil and gas. Lastly, the results indicated that the market value of oil company is a function of PL variable and accounting information relating to proved oil and gas. These findings reinforce the idea that the accounting data are incomplete information for determining the value of an oil company, as the information related to proven reserves of oil and gas contribute to an increasing relevance of the measured accounting variables in historic values. As a result, additional information in the note about the reserves of oil is relevant and necessary, beyond the traditional remarks disclosed in the financial statements.

This research was designed to investigate the relationship between audit risk and the conduct of the audit engagement in the specific context of an oil and gas audit. Because reserve estimates are in the financial reports of oil and gas entities (in the depreciation, depletion and amortization calculation, the limitation on capitalized costs for companies using the full-cost method, and the required supplementary disclosure for companies subject to Securities and Exchange Commission requirements) and because the reserve estimation process is considerably affected by numerous factors, there is a chance that a material error could be incorporated into the financial statement representations with which the auditor is associated. The objective of the research was to (1) identify conditions which are important in an assessment of audit risk in associating with reserve estimates, and (2) determine the impact of some of these conditions on the conduct of the audit.

The established approach to safety management has failed to handle socio-technical systems that have become more complex. The main argument is this approach is based on assumptions that systems are protected against accidents by barriers (well-trained people, redundant mechanisms and safety devices, and procedures and safe systems of work). Complex systems, such as maintenance, are actually labour intensive; maintenance staff often works under pressure to finish tasks as rapidly as possible. They continuously adapt and make adjustments using available resources, time, knowledge, and competence to achieve success. Thus, they are accidents prone. Human factors inherent to maintenance accidents are most times difficult to identify. Research in this area in the oil and gas industry in maintenance management is limited in comparison to the aviation and nuclear sectors. Therefore, it has been suggested to overcome this lack by exploring the maintenance system and identifying appropriate methods and tools that lead a system to safety excellence. Resilience engineering (RE) approach has been found the suitable solution. Moreover, four system abilities (cornerstones of RE: ability to respond, to monitor, to anticipate, and to learn) have been identified to characterise the resilience of a system; if these abilities are known and increased, it will make the system As High Resilient As Possible (AHRAP). However, there is a need to bridge between RE theory and practice. Particularly, a tool that measures these abilities lacks in the oil and gas industry, specifically within the maintenance system. In doing so, a framework based on a Gap Analysis (GA) was outlined. A tool, the MAintenance System Resilience Assessment Tool- MASRAT, was developed to assess current system resilience and identify strategies for improvement to achieve safety excellence. The maintenance system of SONATRACH was explored by the analysis of the system documentation and processes, interviews with maintenance staff, questionnaires, field observations, storytelling, and functional analysis. MASRAT has been validated by means of congruency and principal components analysis, PCA (content validity), and Cronbach’s alpha (reliability). An expert panel testing was carried out to test its usability. The exploration of the system came up with a snapshot of daily activities as well as a better understanding of the maintenance system. The study identified the most significant human factors (resources, time pressure, and supervision/coordination) and their probable impact on plant safety. The elements of the system were found tightly coupled, hence the system complex. Stories describing the continuous adaptations of people to achieve assigned objectives were collected. On the other hand, MASRAT was validated. All items were rated above 0.75 in congruency test. The results of PCA for the three selected factors confirmed the items may be clustered after extraction into four components which interpretation represents the four cornerstones of RE. The analysis showed MASRAT is reproducible. Cronbach’s alpha results were found higher than what is required (0.7). MASRAT was found usable by maintenance expert panel. It was used to measure the maintenance department resilience. Strategies that may lead the system from current maturity level to excellence were identified. Eventually, recommendations were made to management to be implemented both at corporate and department levels. For the first time, the maintenance department resilience of petroleum assets was measured to fill in the gap between RE theory and practice. Besides, this can be of benefit to the petroleum industry by a better knowledge of the maintenance working environment and human factors impact on safety and by profiles determination and improvement strategies identification.

The discovery of commercial quantities of oil and gas resources in the Gulf of Guinea and parts of East Africa has once again raised expectations that sustained development will emerge in one of the world’s poorest regions. At the same time there is great concern that Africa’s new resource-rich countries will succumb to the so-called resource curse phenomenon because of their generally weak governance institutions. In response to this challenge, the international community has intensified its efforts to promote good governance mechanisms in such countries, focused on transparency and accountability, and informed by a dominant institutionalist literature which argues that the differences in resource governance outcomes can be explained by the differences in institutional design and performance. A recent turn to politics in both the development and resource curse literature has begun to move the research agenda beyond the primacy of institutions to look at the politics that underpin the emergence and performance of institutions. This is particularly evidenced in the emerging literature on political settlements that emphasise the distribution of power amongst social groups in society and how these power relations shape institutions and in turn development outcomes. This new political lens is helping to deepen analysis of how and why resource-rich countries prevent or succumb to the resource curse and provides an opportunity to interrogate the inclusive development prospects of Africa’s new oil-rich countries. In this thesis, I apply and extend the political settlement approaches by incorporating ideational and spatial dynamics, to analyse the prospect of inclusive development outcomes in Ghana where oil and gas resources were discovered in 2007. Focusing on the power relations between and amongst national elites and elites in the oil producing Western Region, I interrogate the ways in which the spatial dynamics of Ghana’s prevailing competitive clientelist political settlement is shaping the governance of the oil sector, and the implications it has for inclusive development. I find that at the onset of a resource boom, the dynamics of local politics, and the dominant incentives and ideas generated by the political settlement has strongly shaped the content and enforcement of Ghana’s foundation institutions to manage the oil sector, in ways that reinforces the pre-oil settlement around the governance of natural resources and undermines the long-term prospects for inclusive development. At the same time, the oil boom has also been accompanied by the increased use of formal institutions and suggests that Ghana may be moving away from personalised to more programmatic forms of clientelism.

South Africa is pursuing the exploration and exploitation of its possible petroleum resources particularly shale gas, following the estimation of just over 400 trillion cubic feet (tcf) of shale gas resources in the Karoo region. This, including the lodgement of five shale gas exploration right applications has necessitated the strengthening of the petroleum regulatory framework as well as the fiscal regime to ensure that South Africa remains an attractive destination for investors and for South Africa to extract maximum economic benefits. This paper has undertaken an examination of the current fiscal regime particularly the non-tax elements as stipulated in the current regulatory framework. Upon its face value the South African fiscal regime appears to be underdeveloped and not necessarily designed to cater for development of shale gas. Furthermore, it is not designed to address the specifics of shale gas development within the South African context. Some aspects of the South African fiscal regime may require to be strengthened while also remaining relevant and competitive internationally. A fiscal regime that is flexible and sensitive to shale gas development specific within a country context is required. Consideration for a differentiated tax construction may also be incorporated to make up for allowances provided at the beginning of the project. This will be in line with South Africa’s objectives for the creation of a sustainable and competitive petroleum industry that provides a win-win solution for both government and the industry. / Mini Dissertation (LLM)--University of Pretoria, 2019. / Public Law / LLM / Unrestricted

The Oil and Gas (O&G) Industry has been one of the most environmentally questioned sectors in the lastdecades, where the management of the resources and impact over natural life has been severelycriticized. There are many adverse effects of the activities around the O&G business, from which theconsumption of energy and the emissions of Greenhouse Gases (GHG) stand out to be one of the mostimportant aspects to mitigate. This project studies the actual EnMS in E&P and develops measures of improvement using establishedmanagement tools in the division, applying the principles of the ISO 50001 Standard, to include energysavings and GHG emissions mitigation in the lifecycle of Repsol’s E&P operated assets. The main focuslands over three core elements: the Integrated Project Management platform for new projects, the EnergyPlanning follow-up applications, and the implementation of relevant energy audit outlines.

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