ConocoPhillips has this week started informing its Scottish employees who among them will have to leave as part of a redundancy plan announced earlier this year, which will see up to 450 workers lose their jobs between October this year and April 2020.
In the UK, Conoco has interests in about a dozen fields and employs about 1,300 as staff members and contractors.
Of these, 700 people are based in Aberdeen. A spokeswoman for the company said they had started notifying employees about whether they have a future with Conoco or not.
The redundancies follow plans to halt production at a number of fields in the southern North Sea, which are served by the Theddlethorpe gas terminal. The plans are part of a wider rearrangement of priorities for the US oil giant.
Last week, Conoco and BP agreed to swapped oilfield assets that will see the UK company expand its footprint in the North Sea while Conoco gains assets in Alaska.
The move has led at least one analyst to suggest that the company could entirely leave the North Sea to focus on its business at home.
Luke Parker from oil analysts Wood Mackenzie said that Conoco seemed to have “other priorities closer to home” than the North Sea fields.
12 Jul 2018
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