Longtime Sundre Petroleum Operators Group volunteer Dave Brown has been appointed interim chairman of the organization after chairman Harold Gold resigned for work reasons.
Brown, who worked for Shell Canada for 30 years, has been a SPOG volunteer since its inception. He has been chairman of the SPOG community affairs committee and has sat on numerous other committees over the years.
As chairman he will chair board meetings and is one of the principal spokespersons for the organization. Brown, 75, will hold the position until the next SPOG annual general meeting in November.
SPOG is a collection of oil and gas companies with operations in the Sundre area. It promotes awareness of oil and gas issues through workshops, newsletters, the annual Neighbour's Day open house and through other means, say officials.
The organization also has associate members, including representatives from area municipalities, government regulators, and members of the community at large.
Brown says he knows he takes over the SPOG chairmanship at a time when the Alberta oil and gas industry is facing many challenges.
“Let's face it, we have quite a few things that are major problems for the oil and gas industry right now,” he said. “As you know some Americans are not liking our oil sands and they think it's a dirty mess.
“Then we've got the pipeline issues, which are disrupting to the industry. And we have surface property rights issues right now, and those are also disturbing to the oil and gas industry and the public.
“And fracking is the other big issue, including in this area. That's an issue that needs to be addressed.”
Brown says one of his principal goals as chairman will be to work with other SPOG board members, SPOG staff and community members to promote cooperation and dialogue.
“We have to find our ways through the indecision of government and industry and try to see how SPOG fits in and what efforts we can make to bring some balance to it all,” he said. “There is a change coming and there has to be balance. We need to try to bring people together and that's always been our goal.
“We have all of these things that have to be brought together so we can function. I think it is crucial for all the communities in the province to have a hand in that and I think we in SPOG will try to take some initiatives to talk with the industry and government and see what will happen. This is what's in my mind, this is what I will present to the board and ask what direction we want to take.”
Tracey McCrimmon, executive director of SPOG, says she is confident Brown will do a good job at SPOG's interim chairman.
“He has lots of good experience with SPOG over the years,” said McCrimmon.
As well as being involved with SPOG, Brown was also a founding member of Synergy Alberta in 2002. That organization brings various synergy groups such as SPOG together at the provincial level to promote cooperation and dialogue.
“I chaired Synergy Alberta for the first two years,” said Brown. “Basically after SPOG started up there were a lot of other community groups that started to form. Some of them were true synergy groups and some were opposition groups. I felt that we were running into a problem that it was going to be difficult for the oil and gas industry to deal with all of these groups.
“So I went to the ERCB (Energy Resources Conservation Board) and said I think we should have an umbrella group over the province to establish some sort of balance. After about four years of behind-the-scenes work, we finally got our first synergy conference in 2002.”
Brown said he will decide in November whether he will seek the chair after that.
