Sign up to get full access to all our latest Oil & Gas IQ content, reports, webinars, and online events.

Editorial: Decomissioning: Pensioners & Platforms

Add bookmark

"As you get older, you don't get wiser. You get irritable." - Doris Lessing

And age seems to be this week’s main theme. In Norway, a 16-day long offshore oil and gas workers’ strike was brought to an end as the incumbent government invoked emergency powers to force protesters back to work in the world's second largest gas exporting nation. The belligerents’ cause de guerre? A demand for the right to retire early, at 62, with a full pension.

From retirement of workforce to retirement of workplace, yesterday the UK Treasury announced it would begin consultation to guarantee the long-term tax relief on the decommissioning of ageing infrastructure on the UK Continental Shelf.

With many installations reaching the end of their design life, the cost of mothballing offshore platforms, many of which were never meant to be withdrawn from service, is seen to be prohibitive to the development of extant North Sea prospects. Alleviation of "at least half their decommissioning costs back in tax relief", would significantly free up operators to embark on new ventures on the UKCS.

But will tax relief be enough to revive the mature arena and are companies really ready for the challenges decommissioning? Have your say here.

In Oil and Gas IQ this week, we take a look at:

[inlinead]

LEARN MORE:

Have Your Say
Rate this feature and give us your feedback in the comments section below

Upcoming Events

Subsea Energy

February 10 - 13, 2026

Park Royal Beach Road, Singapore

Subsea Energy

AI in Energy Summit

February 23-25, 2026

Norris Conference Center (CityCentre), Houston, TX

AI in Energy Summit

Methane Mitigation Europe Summit

24-26 February, 2026

Van der Valk Hotel Schiphol, Amsterdam, NL

Methane Mitigation Europe Summit

The Connected Worker: Energy Summit

March 23 - 25, 2026

The Westin Galleria Houston, Texas

The Connected Worker: Energy Summit

Latest Webinars

On Demand Webinar - Unlocking Industrial Innovation: From Data to AI Empowerment

2025-06-10

10:00 AM - 10:45 AM CST

Join us to explore how Celona, Digi and Inductive Automation are helping industrial enterprises enab...

On-Demand: Guide to Ending Connectivity Woes with Private 5G

2025-04-29

08:00 AM - 08:45 AM CST

In this webinar, we break down the five fundamental tenets of private 5G deployment, ensuring maximu...

Webinar: Leveraging AI-Driven Visual Data Science for Enhanced Operational Excellence

2024-11-18

10:00 AM - 10:45 AM EST

Learn how AI-driven exploration, cross-layer data analysis, and visual data science are empowering t...

Recommended