Boom and Bust with Offshore Drilling
1967-1988
Recruited by Cameron Iron Works after the closing of Tubewrights Ltd. in UK as part of the nationalization of the steel industry, Peter emigrated in February of 1967 to Houston, where he has lived ever since and forged a career in the offshore oil and gas world.
After arriving in Houston, unexpected changes happened at Cameron. The team he was part of disbanded and they all left the company. He was the youngest in that team and faced the prospect of a new career in the oil and gas industry that was new to him and doing it in a new country.
First there was a brief stint at The Offshore Company (now Transocean), working for a true industry pioneer and greatly talented and respected engineer –Tim Pease. Peter worked on a variety of assignments, in the office and in West Africa, investigating why a small mat supported jackup flipped over in the Gulf of Mexico, performing structural calculations on new and older larger jackups.
In 1970 Peter started an engineering company in Houston: Engineering Technology Analysts, Inc. or ETA for short. With inspiration from that first real job, and what was learned at The Offshore Company, once again it meant applying rigorous fresh structural analysis methods - as well as recently learned naval architectural and marine talents - in building design methods that led to lower weight structures. It meant doing the analyses and then design of tall structures 3 times higher than what was tested in the Monkey Hole!
In 1973 he negotiated and signed a contract with Robray Offshore Drilling Co. to design a new class of deepwater jackup mobile offshore drilling units for Far East service. They were ultimately built in Singapore, Japan and China, competing against well-established traditional U.S. based designers and builders such as LeTourneau, Bethlehem and Levingston, i.e., the big, experienced designers and builders. These jackups of ETA’s design entered service in 1976 onwards and are shown in the pictures below.
Ednastar and Ednarina, the first two ETA Robray 300 Class jackups, owned and operated by Robray Offshore Drilling Co. of Singapore, later renamed COSL 935 and Bohai IV, now operating in China
Another view of Ednastar, the first ETA Robray 300 class jackup
The Norbe I, an ETA Robray 300 class jackup delivered in 1979 for drilling, then converted 1991-1992 to an accommodation unit for North Sea service
In 1974 Peter negotiated a contract with Dyvi Drilling A/S for designing the world’s 2 largest jackups of that time, for demanding North Sea service with their stringent design codes. These two Europe Class jackups were built at CFEM in France and entered service in 1976 and 1977.
Peter left ETA at the end of 1975 due to major differences with a business partner and changed his business to be the business development agent for two recognized designers and builders of mobile offshore drilling units. Revenues were volatile, in line with contract signings! 1976-1982 saw a short downturn in the business and then a recovery to an all time boom in the offshore drilling business, peaking in 1981.
Cast steel joint pieces were used in the leg structures of both the ETA Robray 300 class and in the ETA Europe class designs.
Shown here are the joint castings at CFEM in France before leg fabrication for Dyvi Beta and Dyvi Gamma jackups
The ETA Europe Class jackup design: Dyvi Beta and Dyvi Gamma at the CFEM shipyard at Dunkerque in France in 1976
The Dyvi Beta in transit in the North Sea
ETA Europe Class jackup design: Dyvi Gamma leaving the shipyard in 1977
The ETA Europe Class jackup design: the Dyvi Beta in 1977
Still going strong in 2017: the Dyvi Beta and the now renamed Petrobaltic Beta in Block B3 in Baltic Sea as a MOPU
The downturn deepened into a real bust and got very difficult, often with consulting clients defaulting or collapsing. Then it coupled with personal difficulties (e.g. wife had a bad stroke).
Eventually after a number of tough and bad years, Peter changed direction to try a permanent job instead of working as a consultant, plus starting with a company engaged in subsea processing and not in the “boom and bust” offshore drilling business sector. So started a 7 year stint in a business which certainly was more stable!
For Lovie and Company as Senior Consultant: Served as expert witness in several major rig loss cases, e.g. for Chevron on loss of the Key Biscayne jackup off the north west coast of Australia in a region known for its being a graveyard for ships over the last four centuries. This multiyear lawsuit against P&O Shipping settled in Chevron’s favor just before trial.
- Represented foreign shipyards and engineering firms in the U.S.
- Negotiated construction contracts and international technical licensing agreements.
- Marketing assessments for new products,
- Troubleshooting consultant for a bank on offshore projects, e.g. finding a basis for projecting if there was any future for a turnkey drilling venture started in offshore Brazil;
- Post 1982, adapted to the energy depression by performing troubleshooting engineering,and marketing assignments for domestic and international clients.
- During 1976-1981 successfully marketed and negotiated numerous construction contracts for Mobile Offshore Drilling Units with Houston drilling contractors on a no-cure, no-pay basis, acting on behalf of US and Singaporean builders (Baker Marine and FELS).
- Introduced concept of "jackup kits" in 1977 to enable broader choice of shipyards for construction of jackups;
For Engineering Technology Analysts, Inc. Founded, led an engineering design firm (1970-1975) that created a new generation of jackups, included the Robray 300 series of jackups that entered service in 1975-1977 and largest then built: the Dyvi Beta and Dyvi Gamma that were precursors to the harsh environment jackups of 20-30 years later. The design employed cast steel nodes, a novelty back then but which have since been often used in offshore structures.
ETA's four patents on jackup design all name Peter Lovie as inventor, e.g. leg design in US Patent 3,967,457. The jackup designs offered variables load capacities double what was typical at that time, reduced need or avoidance of removing leg sections for ocean tows, lower steel weights than competitive designs then used, hence reduced CAPEX.
Shallow water jackupsDuring 1975-1976 ETA was commissioned by Pool Company to design a truss leg shallow water development drilling jackup (3 legs, Pool 142 class) as well as a shallow water 4 legged mat supported unit (Pool 50 class). A total of eight of these shallow water jackups were delivered during 1977-1982.
See article in ETA Innovation for more on the ETA Robray 300 design. For the full story on the ETA jackups, see "ETA and its Jackups: the Six Year Saga", 33 pages, 2017
For The Offshore Company (now Transocean): As Engineer, designed and executed modifications to jackup drilling units in Cameroon and Nigeria.
For Cameron Iron Works (now Cameron), as a structural engineer diagnosed stress problems, designed forging press frames.
For Tubewrights Ltd., a division of Stewarts & Lloyds in UK: management trainee and project manager on development and testing of a 152 ft. high geodetic transmission tower, designed using computers in 1964-1966 and cast steel joints invented by Peter Lovie.