The global oil and gas industry from a UK perspective: lessons from the North Sea

Simon Toole is currently Director Exploration, Licensing and Development in the Energy Group at the Department for Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform. In this role he is responsible for licensing policy, exploration and development with the objective of ensuring that full economic value is gained from the UK’s continental shelf. He previously had responsibility for the Department’s regulation of the UK’s offshore oil and gas environmental regime and initiated the developments made to that regime in the late 1990s.

Simon has been at the Department since 1983 having worked first as a wireline engineer in the UK and Middle East. He has a BSc in Geophysical Science and an MSc in Petroleum Engineering. While at the DTI he has been seconded to Amoco (Operations) and Shell (Gas) and has worked on all aspects of the Department’s regulation of the oil and gas industry.