Joseph H. Bryant, a 27-year veteran of the oil and gas industry, has been named Unocal Corp.’s president and COO, effective Sept. 1. In his new position, the BP executive will lead the company’s domestic and international exploration and production units, as well as Unocal’s reservoir and production engineering, exploration technology, drilling procurement and logistics, engineering and construction, and corporate information groups.

Timothy H. Ling, Unocal’s former COO, died unexpectedly in January (see Daily GPI, Jan. 30). CEO Charles R. Williamson has held the post in the interim.

Bryant, 48, has been president of BP Angola since 2000, and before that, he was president of BP Canada and an Amoco joint venture in China. Bryant also held leadership roles for Amoco business units in The Netherlands and the Gulf of Mexico and numerous engineering, financial and operational assignments throughout the continental United States. In his new position, Bryant will serve on Unocal’s management committee. He will be based at the company’s Sugar Land, TX office, but will divide his time between Texas and Unocal corporate headquarters in El Segundo, CA.

“Joe comes to Unocal with more than 27 years experience in the industry in both the domestic and international arenas,” said Williamson. “He is a proven business leader and brings broad experience in exploration, production, and operations around the world, including management of deepwater developments.”

Unocal has several deepwater projects ongoing. Earlier this year, the company said “major” new developments will be near completion this year, contributing to significant international growth by 2005 (AIOC, Bangladesh, Thailand oil). The company also expects continued deepwater exploration success and appraisal of 2003 deepwater discoveries (St. Malo, Puma, Gehem) and progress on commercialization of Perdido resources (Trident). It also intends to launch Indonesia deepwater gas developments for the Bontang liquefied natural gas plant.

In leading BP’s oil and gas exploration, development, and production activities in Angola, Bryant guided a highly successful drilling program on BP’s first share of Angolan oil from the Girassol field and participated in the development of the Kizomba fields.

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