ACCESS NUMBER: 30660-19934 

STUDY TITLE: Forecasting the Number of Offshore Platforms on the Gulf of Mexico 

OCS to the Year 2023 

REPORT TITLE: Forecasting the Number of Offshore Platforms on the Gulf of Mexico 

OCS to the Year 2023 

CONTRACT NUMBER: 14-35-0001-30660-19934 

SPONSORING OCS REGION: Gulf of Mexico 

APPLICABLE PLANNING AREA: Western, Central, Eastern 

FISCAL YEAR(S) OF PROJECT FUNDING: 1996 

COMPLETION DATE OF REPORT: April 2001 

COST(S): FY 1996: $53,952.85; CUMMULATIVE PROJECT COST: $53,952.85 

PROJECT MANAGER: A. Pulsipher 

AFFILIATION: Louisiana State University, Center for Energy Studies 

ADDRESS: 1 East Fraternity Circle, Baton Rouge, Louisiana 70803 

PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR*: A. Pulsipher 

KEY WORDS: Gulf of Mexico; forecasting; offshore platforms; outer continental shelf 

BACKGROUND: There have been about 5,600 offshore structures installed and 

operated by oil and gas companies in the United States. The nation’s stock of offshore 

platforms is one of the primary components of its economic and physical capital. 

Constructing, operating, and removing platforms interacts with the economies and 

ecologies of adjacent coastal areas in important ways (positively as well as negatively). 

Although firms operating in the Gulf of Mexico conduct detailed engineering and 

economic planning studies to schedule platform installations and removals on their 

leases, little analysis has focused on how the entire collection of offshore platforms is 

likely to change over time and what variables or influences are responsible for those 

changes. 

OBJECTIVES: (1) To make a forecast of the number of offshore platforms that will be 

removed, installed, and operated in the Gulf over the next two decades; and (2) To 

discuss the principal determinants and characteristics of the forecast as well as some of 

the uncertainties and implications of this forecast for the industries and individuals that 

use the Gulf’s resources and the agencies that are responsible for their management 

and regulation. 
ACCESS NUMBER: 30660-19934 

DESCRIPTION: The forecasts in this report predict the number of new offshore 

structures to be installed, removed, and operated on the Gulf of Mexico OCS over the 

next twenty-five years 1999 to 2023. The forecasts were made by using econometric 

modeling techniques on historical data from1947 through 1996. 

SIGNIFICANT CONCLUSIONS: The most likely, or reference, forecast of the number 

of operating offshore structures on the Gulf of Mexico shows a decline of about 29 

percent over the period 1999 to 2023. The decline will occur because the number of 

platforms being removed is predicted to increase significantly above current levels, 

while the number of platforms being installed is predicted to increase only slightly above 

current levels. As a consequence of this pattern, and the larger size of the platforms 

being installed, overall activity in removing and installing platforms increases 

significantly, despite the decline in the number of operating platforms during the forecast 

period. 

STUDY RESULTS: The total number of oil and gas platforms located in the federal or 

OCS part of the U.S. Gulf of Mexico is forecast to begin a slow but steady decline over 

the first quarter of the next century. The plateau of about 3,600 structures that was 

reached and maintained during the 1990s is a peak, according to the forecast, and the 

drop-off-period for the decline. 

By the year 2023 the number of platforms in the Gulf is forecast to be roughly 2,600, a 

drop of 1,075 platforms for a total that will be about 29 percent below the current peak. 

Alternative forecasts made by changing the values of the forecasting variables did not 

result in major differences from the reference forecast. Even spreading the range of the 

values used in the forecasting equations by adding two standard errors to forecasting 

variables did not reverse the trends in the reference forecast. Adding or subtracting two 

standard errors to the cumulative size of new oil and gas field developed in the Gulf and

to the Energy Information Agency’s forecast of oil prices resulted in forecasts in which 

the decline in operating platforms in high forecast was still more than 20 percent, as 

compared to 29 percent in the reference forecast. The decline in the corresponding low 

forecast was about 35 percent. 

STUDY PRODUCTS: Pulsipher, A.G., O.O. Iledare, D.V. Mesyanzhinov, A. Dupont, 

and Q.L. Zhu. 2001. Forecasting the number of offshore platforms on the Gulf of Mexico 

OCS to the year 2023. Prepared by the Center for Energy Studies, Louisiana State 

University, Baton Rouge, La. OCS Study MMS 2001-013. U.S. Department of the 

Interior, Minerals Management Service, Gulf of Mexico OCS Region, New Orleans, LA 

66 pp. 

*P.I.’s affiliation may be different than that listed for Project Manager(s).