Raoul Restucci is Executive Vice President of Shell Exploration and Production for the Middle East, Caspian and South Asia and, as such, he has a vast geographical footprint of responsibility, which involves a great deal of travelling. He talks about his roots, his career to date and his current business priorities. When asked about his favourite way to relax, he responds by saying, believe it or not, “I love to travel and discover new places!” ‘Shell in the Middle East’ finds out more...

Q. Where were you born, brought up and educated?

I was born in St Albans in the UK because my father, who is Italian, was on an assignment at an Air Force base near London at the time. My mother was born in England and met my father whilst teaching English as a foreign language in Rome. Her mother and father lived in St Albans.

Notwithstanding my strong British links, I consider Italy, or rather Rome, where I spent most of my pre-adult years, to be very much my home and my mother, whilst retaining links with her family in England, is today very much an Italian. I am the elder of two brothers and my brother and his family live in Milan.

In the early days of my life, as a family we moved quite a lot as my father was posted around the world on various assignments. Most of my primary and secondary school education took place in Italy, in Rome, but I learned English whilst at junior high school in Arlington, just outside Washington DC. This was during one of my father’s postings to the USA where he was working at the Italian Embassy.

At school I enjoyed studying a combination of physics and philosophy, the latter helping me to envisage the fourth dimension. I was also keen on sports and played basketball and tennis, and subsequently moved to ‘470’ dinghy sailing. I also became a keen photographer and, indeed, today this is still one of my main hobbies.

After school I joined the University of Rome to study engineering, a five-year course, but after one year, in 1976, student revolution broke out on the Italian campuses with the growth of support for political extremist groups.

This was, at times, more of a political fashion statement with a small but very active minority, but it proved to be highly disruptive with the frequent use of Molotov Cocktails, homemade explosive devices made from petrol. As a result I opted to complete my studies overseas and joined the department of Mining Engineering at Nottingham University in the UK, where I specialised in Petroleum Engineering in my final year.

Q. What was your first career move after university?

One of the requirements of my university course was that we had to gain on-the-job petroleum engineering work experience in the summer holidays. I contacted several oil companies and was impressed with Shell’s offer which, aside from basic training and an interesting project assignment, included the opportunity to visit one of the offshore platforms in the northern North Sea.

The choice of Shell was easy then and I’ve never looked back. Shell subsequently sponsored me through university and, in 1980, a month after graduating, I joined Shell.

I met my wife, Kim, who is from Liverpool in England, whilst at University, where she was studying geography and we got married in Holland six months after I joined Shell.

I started off with Shell in The Hague and underwent months of intensive training before being posted to Brunei, where I remained for more than four years. I began work in Brunei as a well site Petroleum Engineer, before moving into Production Engineering and subsequently Economics and Planning. It was a wonderful assignment with high levels of activity, from complex exploration through to sophisticated Enhanced Oil Recovery pilot projects, and we established good new friendships. One of my great memories of Brunei is the birth of my first child and daughter, Chiara.

Q. What were your next postings after Brunei?

I was then posted to Qatar, where my next two children, Hannah and Karl, were born. I was initially Head of Economics and Planning at Qatar General Petroleum Corporation [QGPC - Offshore].

Shell has a long relationship with Qatar and was actively involved in the early stages of discovery of the North Field, now the epicentre for one of the largest gas development programmes in the world.

My next role at QGPC was as Senior Production Technologist, a position I enjoyed very much. Indeed, today I still consider myself a dyed-in-the-wool production engineer, and I continue to read up on the latest advances in artificial lift and other technologies to enhance well and production system performance. After four years in Qatar I moved to The Hague, to the job of Liaison Engineer for South America, which in my case involved frequent travelling and engagements in Columbia, Peru and Venezuela.

These were very interesting but difficult times. Shell Columbia was undertaking drilling operations in the mountainous and geologically complex southern region, while pipelines suffered frequent and extensive damage from guerrilla attacks. Venezuela was just opening up its campos marginales reactivation programme to International Oil Companies and we were also actively involved in development studies for an LNG [Liquefied Natural Gas] project.

In Peru, we had a huge gas field which was, unfortunately, on the wrong side of the Andes. I recall the extensive engineering studies and satellite photography to plan a 700 kilometre pipeline route across the Andes to the outskirts of Lima, but gas demand at the time was insufficient to kick-start a project of this scale.

My next assignment was possibly the most challenging but most rewarding assignment of my career to date. It was the position of Petroleum Engineering Manager with Shell’s joint venture, Al Furat Petroleum Company [AFPC] in Syria.

At this time AFPC was rapidly expanding to its peak production of 400,000 barrels of oil per day. The amount of drilling and opening up of new fields, along with the sub-surface and geological challenges, all combined to make this a very rewarding experience. AFPC was then, and still is today, one of the most efficient producers with top-ranking production system uptime.

This was also a very interesting time politically in Syria, as the country was looking more towards the west than it had in the past. Foreign investment was rapidly increasing, and living in Damascus, being able to witness the buzz in the community and opening up of the country, was exhilarating.

Q. After Syria you had a change of direction in your career with Shell, working in London, The Hague and then on to the United States. Can you tell us more about these assignments?

Yes, after Syria I had a two-year stint, from 1996 to 1998, in London, working at Shell Trading & Shipping Company as General Manager for Crude Oil Acquisition and Government Accounts.

This effectively meant managing the lifting of Shell’s equity crude, and the purchase of third party crude from mainly Middle Eastern countries and Russia. In a number of countries from which we were purchasing very significant amounts of crude, Shell had a minimal upstream presence, or none at all. These countries included Iran, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq.

Travelling to Baghdad and negotiating crude oil lifting contracts was almost surreal. Western governments were discussing the political future of Iraq whilst I was there discussing oil contracts.

The trading world was quite different from anything I had known previously. In exploration and production we consider three to five years a typical scale for medium-term planning. In trading, years turn into weeks if not days and value at risk is managed by the hour.

However, my time in trading gave me a much better understanding of Shell’s downstream operations and the broad expertise, operational excellence and great relationships which Shell has across the value chain. These strengths and relationships have today allowed us to develop new business opportunities for Shell’s upstream sector across the region.

My next role was as Regional Business Director for the Far East and Australasia in Shell’s E&P business, joining what was known as the EP Business Committee.

I was based in The Hague but spent much of my time on an aeroplane as the region has an enormous geographical footprint, from New Zealand in the south to China in the north. As it is today, the area then was buzzing with activity and opportunity. We expanded our business in New Zealand through the acquisition of Fletcher Challenge, we tried and failed in the acquisition of Woodside in Australia, developed positions in China and saw a lot of development and expansion in two of Shell’s largest operating units in the region, Shell Brunei and Shell Malaysia.

Other business opportunities in which we were involved at that time were in China, with entry into its gas business, the development and part dilution of Shell’s Malampaya operation in the Philippines and production and exploration activities in Thailand and Indonesia respectively.

This was a fantastic era of activity and the whole region is such a wonderful place in which to travel with such diverse cultures and people.

My next move was to take me halfway across the world, to Houston in Texas, as President and CEO of Shell Exploration & Production Companies in the US, with its two key centres in Houston and New Orleans.

Shell was and continues to be a leading deepwater operator in the Gulf of Mexico, setting industry benchmarks and multiple records over several decades. It was a privilege to work with professionals and pioneers alike, always ready to take on the next deepwater challenge.

During my time in the States, Shell also focused increasingly on domestic onshore gas production and we acquired the Pinedale acreage in Wyoming, which is now a very significant operation.

Q. Your job in the States preceded the position you hold today as Executive Vice President for Shell Exploration and Production for the Middle East, Caspian and South Asia, a job which is based in Dubai. Can you give an overview of your current business priorities concerning your area of responsibility?

Shell has extensive operations throughout the Middle East, the Caspian and South Asian region. These operations stretch from our significant interests in the huge Kashagan field in the northern Caspian to one of our largest joint ventures with Petroleum Development Oman. We are very active across the full value chain, with exploration in Saudi Arabia, Syria, onshore and offshore Egypt and in the Caspian, through to joint venture operations and new business development efforts across several countries in the region.

Simply put, it is a very dynamic and exciting place to work. Relationships are extremely important and are based on a set of values – which are very much family values – to which I personally adhere.

The Middle East is clearly a region that is endowed with vast quantities of oil and gas, which makes it a region of great importance to any energy company.

Oman, where Shell has been involved for 70 years now, has always been of major importance to Shell. Its oil industry is one of the most mature and is probably five to ten years ahead of much of the industry in terms of the exploration and production challenges it faces.

Today many of Oman’s oil and gas reservoirs require enhanced recovery technologies to maximise production and ultimate recovery. The days of easy oil are coming to an end and during the next few years I am sure that we will see the technologies, such as thermal processes, miscible gas and polymer injection currently being implemented in Oman, being used increasingly in the more mature reservoirs of other Middle Eastern countries.

Another significant challenge the Middle East is facing is the increased demand for gas. The huge level of expansion throughout the region is creating a rapidly rising demand for gas in both the domestic consumer market, as well as to fuel the massive industrial growth and the demand for additional power and water supplies. This is placing considerable strain on the region’s gas production capacity, and countries will have to develop new gas supply options and establish new regional supply networks.

Furthermore, the rising costs of major projects, worldwide, whether in the oil and gas sector or in the construction, power and industrial sectors, has significantly raised gas prices, which up until recently have been relatively low and have fuelled a great deal of the region’s expansion.

One of Shell’s key strategies is the commitment to develop more integrated gas options, from extending our LNG leadership through to sour gas plays. To achieve this we rely on leveraging technology such as enhanced recovery techniques through to new value propositions, such as our Gas to Liquids project in Qatar. I would add that it is our ability to integrate across the full value chain, from exploration through to LNG marketing, that often provides us with a competitive advantage.

Q. How much longer do you expect to be in this job, and what do you plan to achieve in more general terms during this time?

I have only been back in the Middle East for two years and look forward to several more years before I move on. My goal is to deliver on external expectations and on the aspirations of Shell’s regional business plan and to re-enforce key relationships across the region. As previously stated, together with my colleagues in Gas & Power, New Business Development and Exploration, I will work to effectively leverage Technology, Integration and Scale across the region. Integral to our plans will be increased efforts aimed at establishing sustainable longer-term solutions, from CO2 [carbon dioxide] management to the development of national and regional human resources.

There are many talented young men and women graduating from universities across the region. Given the tremendous demand for staff in the region at Shell we are continuously seeking ways to recruit, attract and retain these young people.

Q. It is an enormous job, so what do you do to relax?

Believe it or not, I love to travel and discover new places. Indeed, I have been a nomad all my life. Just earlier this year I had a fantastic holiday in Rajasthan, in India, with my wife. I have also always been very interested in photography and enjoy editing and enhancing my photographs on the computer. However, I am very much a family man and like to spend time with my wife and children. As my children get older, both my wife and I stay in regular contact with them, visiting them or staying close by e-mail, even when, as with my eldest daughter, they set off on journeys up the Amazon and other far-flung destinations. So it seems that travel features strongly in our family, both for work and play.