The subsea segment of the oil and gas industry is the by far the fastest growing industry in the world today. The global turnover is expected to grow by 30% from today towards 2011. This creates opportunites for companies that are not part of this booming oil anmd gas industry today..

A recent study shows that the players in the oil and gas industry is finding new platforms to collaborate on. The buyers no longer trust their own contact database to be the one to find suppliers that gives them the lowest price. Online platforms like OilGasPortal.Com - the oil and gas industry business directory provide the oil and gas industry with the platform they need to source the lowest bidder in minutes. These eBusiness markets are not yet fully recoginzed, but the players using them are certainly the winners in the long term. The study showed that the avaerage supply chain manegment could save as much 30% by actively using such platforms. 

The upstream oil sector is an international market, with investment and operational decisions increasingly determined against world norms, heavily influenced by both the current world oil price and anticipated price for its impact on new field developments.

The volatility of the oil price has led to changes in the structure of the oil sector, encompassing both the oil companies and their various contractors. In particular there has been consolidation both horizontally and vertically in the traditional contracting supply chain.

The oil and gas industry classifies "crude" oil by were it was produced of its origin and often by its relative weight (API gravity or viscosity ("light", "intermediate" or "heavy"); in addition it may also be reffered to as "sweet" ( it contains relatively little sulfur), or as "sour" (it contains substantial amounts of sulfur) and requires more refining in order to meet current petroleum specifications. This article gives a brief list of the reference barrels.

Liquefied natural gas, or LNG, is natural gas when processed to its liquid form. When natural gas is cooled down to minus -161 degrees Celsius, the natural gas then becomes a clear, colorless, odorless liquid. Liquefied natural gas, LNG, is neither corrosive nor toxic. The natural gas is primarily methane, with smaller concentrations of other hydrocarbons, water, carbon dioxide, nitrogen, oxygen and some sulfur compounds. This oil and gas article on gives a brief overview of LNG.

Once exploration wells have confirmed commercially reservoirs of natural gas or petroleum deposits, it is economical to build a permanent offshore production platform from which well completion and oil and gas production can be made. These permanent platforms are often very expensive and generally require large deposits of hydrocarbons to be economical to develop. Some of todays largest offshore platforms are located in the North Sea, where large structures able to withstand high winds and large waves are necessary. There are a number of different types of permanent offshore production platforms, each useful for a particular depth range. This article will give an overview of the most common.

Alaskan crude oil production originates mainly from the North Slope, which includes the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A) and the State lands surrounding Prudhoe Bay. Because oil and gas producers are prohibited from building permanent roads in NPR-A, exploration and production are expected to be about 30 percent more expensive than is typical for the North Slope of Alaska.

Aside from acting as a transit center for other countries' oil and natural gas exports from the Caspian Sea, Iran has potentially significant Caspian reserves of its own, although only a small amount (0.1 billion barrels) has been proven as "recoverable." Currently, Iran has no oil or natural gas production in the Caspian region. In early 2004, a 3-D seismic survey of the southern Caspian was being conducted by Iran's Oil Survey Co.

The Doroud 1&2, Salman, Abuzar, Foroozan, and Sirri fields comprise the bulk of Iran's offshore oil output. Iran plans extensive development of existing offshore fields and hopes to raise its offshore production capacity significantly. In early October 2003, Iran re-launched a tender for eight exploration blocks in the Persian Gulf after receiving little interest from a January 2003 announcement (Iran may launch a second licensing round in the next few months).

The Iranian constitution prohibits the granting of petroleum rights on a concessionary basis or direct equity stake. However, the 1987 Petroleum Law permits the establishment of contracts between the Ministry of Petroleum, state companies and "local and foreign national persons and legal entities." Buyback contracts, for instance, are arrangements in which the contractor funds all investments, receives remuneration from NIOC in the form of an allocated production share, then transfers operation of the field to NIOC after the contract is completed.