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24 July, 2006
The month-long strike by Norway’s NOPEF union that is beginning to cripple energy production across the country’s oil patch will get an airing today before a state mediator. It will be the government’s second attempt to resolve issues that prompted NOPEF to strike a selective list of oil service companies on 21 June.
Efforts just prior to the start of the strike by the state mediator failed.
The strategic strike by 87 NOPEF trade unionists is aimed at normalising the national oil services’ work agreement with other national contracts inside Norway’s energy sector. Work schedules and working terms and conditions common to other staff inside the sector remains the central issue to the strike.
The striking NOPEF members are employed by Halliburton, Baker Hughes, Schlumberger, Weatherford and Oceaneering. Other oil service companies such as Aker Kvaerner, Geoservices, and Acergy are also affected. Major oil companies that are losing time and money on well development projects, new drilling exploration, and maintenance include Statoil, ConocoPhillips, Norsk Hydro, Shell, ExxonMobil, and Chevron.
Work has been interrupted at Statoil’s Snorre and Stratford platforms, and at the Norwegian state company’s northern Snøhvit and Kristin oil fields, while the strike has slowed work at Norsk Hydro’s Heidrun and Oseberg platforms, and at ConocoPhillip’s Ekofisk platform.