Edwin H. (Ned) Niccolls
Chevron Fellow

Profile:

1. B.S. Chemical Engineering - Stanford University (California, USA) 1975
2. M.S. Materials Science & Engineering - Stanford University (California, USA) 1975
3. Exec. MBA - St. Mary’s College (California, USA) 2001

Ned was born in Detroit, USA but he grew up in Germany and Virginia, finally settling in California.  While at college, Ned worked two summers at Chevron as a refinery laborer and a summer engineer.  During these years, Ned also developed a great interest in Materials Science and Engineering, and the early combination of a love for Materials and the Chevron Refining experience eventually led to a career of over thirty years in Materials and Corrosion.

Ned’s first Chevron position in 1977 was in an old “Materials Lab”, then, he transferred to the Richmond Refinery as a Design Engineer, then on to the San Francisco Materials Staff.  In 1982-1984, Ned went to Pascagoula, Mississippi as that refinery’s first materials engineer, followed by an assignment as the Richmond refinery materials engineer.  Ned came back to the Corporation for a variety of assignments including leader of a Nonmetallics team and both Upstream and Downstream Materials Engineering work.  Among other duties, he served as the Materials Laboratory supervisor and Corrosion/Refining group team leader.  Later, Ned focused on technical specialist roles, first as lead Refining metallurgist, and later lead Refining Corrosion specialist.

Currently, Ned’s responsibilities involve advanced materials and corrosion research and development, and integrating Upstream and Downstream materials/corrosion efforts.  He was appointed a Chevron Fellow by the Chevron Chairman of the Board in 2007.

Title:  Corrosion Management for Reliable Facilities

Abstract:

Managing corrosion to ensure safe, reliable, and cost effective operations of oil and gas facilities requires integrating cultural, procedural, technical, and human elements.  We will briefly note some important cultural and procedural aspects, and then focus on the technical and human elements.  We will discuss the challenges presented by more aggressive and varied environments, aging facilities, and in some cases an aging workforce!  We will describe what we believe to be the key components of effective corrosion management.  We will relate specific lessons learned from a major effort to significantly improve the reliability of a large multi-refinery system.  Conclusions will be drawn that apply to oil and gas facilities in general.

Dr. Jim Palmer
Managing Director, Intertek/CAPCIS, (UK)

Profile:

Dr Jim Palmer has over 25 years experience in corrosion consultancy.  He has lead research programs on topics related to CO2 Corrosion, Corrosion Inhibition, Effects of Flow, Localized Corrosion in Sour Systems, Corrosion Monitoring and Materials Behavior in HF Environments.  Jim was Chairman of the EFC Oil & Gas Committee on Inhibition that produced Industry guidelines for Corrosion Inhibitor Selection and Deployment.  For the past four years he has been Managing Director of CAPCIS Ltd, now part of the Intertek Group.

Title: Role of R&D in Mitigating Corrosion

Abstract:

The role of research in developing corrosion mitigation and monitoring techniques over recent years, with particular focus on the Oil & Gas Industry is reviewed.  Changes in budgets and approaches to Research & Development projects are considered.  Some of the key research challenges that we face over the coming years are described, with particular reference to the requirements for enhanced materials and chemical treatment performance in increasingly aggressive operating conditions.