Oilfield

Oilfield services provider Platinum Energy Solutions Inc. filed plans with the Securities and Exchange Commission to sell up to $300 million of common stock in an initial public offering. The Houston-based company, which specializes in hydraulic fracturing in unconventional oil and natural gas plays, coiled tubing and other pressure pumping services, has operations in Texas and northwestern Louisiana. Platinum’s “quintuplex” pumping units are capable of delivering up to 2,500 hydraulic horsepower with an 80% efficiency, according to the company. Platinum said it has applied to list its stock on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker FRAC.

Shale drilling beyond North America may be moving at a snail’s pace but the opportunities for oilfield service operators overseas are “fantastic and phenomenal,” according to Halliburton Co. CEO Dave Lesar.

Mountainview Energy Ltd. announced it intends to acquire a 20% interest in approximately 67,000 gross acres (about 13,400 net acres) in the Bakken/Three Forks Shale in a stock deal valued at about C$21.5 million. The parcels are located in the Medicine Lake Prospect, which is in Divide County, ND, and Richland, Roosevelt and Sheridan counties, MT. The acquisition will increase Mountainview’s position in the Williston Basin to approximately 25,400 net acres.

National Oilwell Varco Inc. (NOV), the largest U.S. oilfield equipment manufacturer, on Tuesday posted higher than expected quarterly profits, in part on rig technology orders, which jumped 26% in the period.

BP plc has filed a lawsuit against Halliburton Co., claiming that the oilfield service operator’s “misconduct” contributed to the April 2010 blowout of the Macondo well and explosion aboard the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico. BP also has filed claims against Deepwater Horizon owner and operator Transocean Ltd., as well as Cameron International, which manufactured the well’s blowout preventer. BP said the presidential commission investigating the disaster had concluded that the cement slurry designed, mixed and pumped by Halliburton failed, and that results of the failed tests were not provided, which caused technicians to miss “critical signals that hydrocarbons were flowing into the wellbore.” A BP spokesman said the company was not seeking a specific sum from Halliburton but would ask for damages up to the total cost of the spill. BP is seeking at least $40 billion in damages from Transocean and seeks to force Cameron to contribute “all or part of the damages” that may be levied against BP by the U.S. government.

A Colorado family alleges in a lawsuit filed Thursday that natural gas driller Antero Resources Corp. and two oilfield service subcontractors contaminated their drinking water supply and air, which forced the couple and their two children to abandon their home.

Drilling in natural gas liquids-weighted plays and oil shales are expected to be the focus of domestic exploration and production (E&P) companies in 2011, energy analysts with FBR Capital Markets said Monday.

Chesapeake Energy Corp. has opened a $7 million oilfield services and training center in the heart of the Marcellus Shale that offers all of the comforts of home — and then some.

National Oilwell Varco Inc. (NOV), one of the biggest equipment manufacturers in the oilfield services industry, last week reported a huge jump in its backlog for rig equipment orders in North America.