Record number of participants at the IBA Middle East Competition

AAPG's Imperial Barrel Award (IBA) Program is an annual prospective basin evaluation contest for geoscience students from universities around the globe. The participants analyze geological, geophysical, land, economic and production data in a real world scenario. The IBA regional and section competition winners qualify to compete against each other in the international finals during the Annual Convention & Exhibition (ACE), taking place in the USA, for a chance to win scholarship funds for their school.

The 7th Regional Imperial Barrel Award Competition took place on the 6th of March at the ART Rotana Hotel in Bahrain. This year the competition attracted a record number of teams from across the region. In total there were 8 teams representing universities from Kuwait, Jordan, Oman, Saudi Arabia and the UAE who came together to showcase their knowledge and expertise to the panel of judges.

Each team had a total of 25 minutes to present their work and how they reached their conclusions, which was then followed by a 10 minute question and answer session with the judges. The judging panel was comprised of the following industry professionals:

• Robert Kuchinski, AAPG Middle East President
• Abdelfattah Bakhiet, Saudi Aramco
• Aziza Moumen Bouhlel, Schlumberger

After the eight teams had presented it took the judges nearly one hour of deliberating to agree on who should be presented with the winner’s trophy and go on to represent the region in the international finals.

• 1st Place: Sultan Qaboos University (Muscat, Oman), led by Dr. Iftikhar Ahmed
• 2nd Place: United Arab Emirates University (Al Ain, UAE), led by Dr. Amir Gabr
• 3rd Place: German University of Technology in Oman (Muscat, Oman), led by Mrs. Haufa Al Salmi and Dr. Wiekert Visser

Sultan Qaboos University, as the winning team of the regional competition, will now go on to compete against the other regional and section winners at the IBA finals which will be held in Calgary, AB, Canada on the 19th June during the AAPG Annual Convention & Exhibition (ACE).

The 8th Imperial Barrel Award Competition will take place in the UAE in March 2017. If you wish to participate, please contact the AAPG Middle East office.

Learn more about the AAPG student chapters in the region.

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