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Offshore

Offshore staff

HOUSTON -- National oil companies (NOCs) will play a significant role in the future of oil and gas developments around the world. Masahisa Naitoh, chairman and CEO of The Institute of Energy Economics in Japan, told participants at a conference at Rice University in Houston on March 1, "NOCs have great influence on the world oil market."

Naitoh discussed his views regarding the role NOCs will play in the coming years, emphasizing how important he believes that role will be. NOCs hold 77% of the world's oil reserves, he said.

According to Naitoh, it will be impossible to explore for oil and gas internationally without working closely with NOCs. "We have found that understanding NOC oil strategies is important to securing the world oil supply," he said.

One of the things necessary to move the current situation forward, Naitoh said, is cooperation.

"We should focus on international cooperation to address the international energy situation," he said. "International cooperation should focus on elimination of investment barriers, and further cooperation is required between resource suppliers and consumers."

Naitoh also talked about the value of international cooperation in the form of research, noting that the partnership between his organization and the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy has been a fruitful one. "We have had very good, useful results from this study partnership," he said. "I expect the study to further deepen our understanding beyond fundamental findings."

The focus of the two-day conference was the changing role of NOCs in international energy markets.

3/1/2007