The World Petroleum Council (WPC) proudly announced that Guilherme De Oliveira Estrella, the Chief Exploration and Production Officer and Member of the Executive Board of Brazil’s Petrobras will be the recipient of the WPC’s prestigious Dewhurst Award in 2011. Presented to Estrella during the 20th World Petroleum Congress in Doha, Qatar, in December this year, the Award is named after Thomas Dewhurst, who organized the first World Petroleum Congress in 1933. Celebrating scientific and technological excellence in the petroleum industry, the Award is a tribute to him and to the person asked to deliver the Dewhurst Lecture.
Having led the pre-salt discoveries in the deep waters off the coast of Brazil, Guilherme Estrella joins a prestigious group of past recipients who have been respected leaders in the industry and demonstrated unusually high achievements over many years. Like his predecessors such as the previous recipient, HE Ali Al Naimi, Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, Estrella will be giving the Dewhurst Lecture, one of the highlights of the event, at the close of the world’s largest oil and gas congress on the 8th December.
The President of the World Petroleum Council, Dr Randy Gossen, met Mr Estrella in Rio de Janeiro earlier this year and personally informed him about the decision. “At a time when the world is saying we are running out of oil and gas comes an innovator who is not restricted by the views of others but leads the way in finding new reserves and pursuing unconventional oil resources. Having Guilherme Estrella, an outstanding geologist and visionary oil finder, as our distinguished Dewurst lecturer could not be more appropriate.”
Dr Renato Bertani, Vice President of the World Petroleum Council also has great praise for his former colleague at Petrobras: “Estrella, as his colleagues and friends call him, dedicated a lifetime to the petroleum industry in Brazil and abroad. His approach to petroleum exploration was always based on rigorous application of geoscience principles, innovation and, above all, team work. Estrella is a firm believer, and practitioner, that oil is found first in people’s minds. And the huge pre-salt oil discoveries offshore Brazil demonstrate that he is right.”