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Portrait ofPaula Kidd

Paula Kidd

Partner

Contact
CMS Cameron McKenna Nabarro Olswang LLP
6 Queens Road
Aberdeen
AB15 4ZT
United Kingdom
Languages English

Paula is a partner in the Oil and Gas Department.

With more than 450 energy and climate change lawyers, including over 100 partners, the CMS Energy and Climate Change practice is one of the largest of its kind in the world. Led from its centres of excellence such as London and Aberdeen, the practice works across 75 offices globally. Building on 40 years of experience advising on power, oil & gas and renewables through to energy disputes, emerging areas and Energy Transition, CMS is uniquely placed to ensure clients receive advice best suited to their commercial needs and to our collective future.

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"Paula is excellent. She's well-informed and gives comprehensive advice."

Chambers, 2024

"She's an excellent lawyer. She's knowledgeable and could do this work any day of the week."

Chambers, 2024

"Paula is pleasant to work with, gets into the weeds and is a very serious player to engage with."

Chambers, 2024

"Paula will always go the extra mile. She's also very diligent and thoughtful in her advice.

Chambers, 2023

"She is very pragmatic to deal with and really knows her stuff. She's a star of the future."

Chambers, 2023

"She's very approachable and delivers pragmatic and incisive advice."

Legal 500, 2020

"pragmatic, professional and approachable."

Chambers, 2019

'responsive and diligent'

Legal 500, 2018

Education

  • 2008 – Dip.L.P., University of Aberdeen
  • 2007 – LLB (Hons), University of Aberdeen 
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27/02/2024
NSTA Consultation on Carbon Storage Data
In 2023, the UK’s first carbon storage licensing round led to the award of 21 offshore carbon storage licences. A handful of licenses had been awarded prior to the licensing round, so that there are...
26/01/2024
A “Move” to Annual Oil and Gas Offshore Licensing Rounds - The Offshore...
Under the recently introduced Offshore Petroleum Licensing Bill (the Bill), the North Sea Transition Authority (the NSTA) would have a new obligation to invite applications for new seaward area (oil and...
23/01/2024
Key oil and gas provisions of the Energy Act 2023 become effective from...
The Energy Act 2023 (the “Energy Act”) received Royal Assent on 26 October 2023. The Energy Act has been years in the making and represents a significant step in the UK's efforts to achieve net zero...
23/01/2024
OEUK Decommissioning Security Agreements – Default Provisions
It is crucial to the operation of the arrangements set out in decommissioning security agreements (“DSA”) that parties post the required security within the timelines set out in the DSA as well as...
22/12/2023
Energy Act 2023: creative licence – overview of carbon dioxide and hydrogen...
Following our general update on the enactment of the Energy Act 2023 (EA23), this article looks in a little more depth at Parts 1 and 3 of EA23 regarding the new licensing regime for the trans­port­a­tion...
19/12/2023
Meeting the Decommissioning Challenge in Southeast Asia
Following on from our previous Law Now on the decommissioning regime in the UK (see our Law-Now here and here, this Law-Now considers the issues and challenges facing the offshore decommissioning sector...
09/11/2023
The Energy Act 2023
The Energy Act 2023 (the Act) received Royal Assent on 26 October 2023, and represents a significant step in the UK's efforts to achieve net zero emissions by 2050. The Act introduces measures to support...
03/11/2023
OEUK DSA – Calculation and Payment of Licensee’s share of De­com­mis­sion­ing...
Parties to decommissioning security agreements are likely to be entering into an important phase of the typical process contained in these agreements. This year in particular, due to high inflation (and...
24/10/2023
High Court Dismisses Greenpeace and Uplift’s Judicial Review Claim Against...
The High Court in London has handed down a judgment dismissing Greenpeace and Uplift’s judicial review challenge against the North Sea Transition Authority’s (the “ NSTA ”) 33rd Offshore Oil and...
24/10/2023
CMS European Energy Sector M&A and Investment Outlook 2024
As the world economy increasingly embraces the push towards decarbonisation, Europe has actively sought to place itself at the vanguard of the discussion on energy trans­ition. Op­por­tun­it­ies to deploy capital abound as power sources switch further towards offshore and onshore wind, solar, heat, hydrogen, battery storage, new networks, carbon capture, and industrial decarbonisation. The latter brings an interface with other sectors such as technology companies (with power hungry data centres a particular focus), real estate, low carbon transport and decarbonisation of industrial processes such as cement, glass and steel production. As much as it is difficult, complex and highly political, the energy transition is also a huge business opportunity. To reach net zero by 2050, the International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that global investment in clean energy alone will need to increase from the USD390bn in the first half of 2023, to USD 1.3tn in 2030. Many commentators worried that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine would put back the transition and shift Europe back towards fossil fuels. While it appears to have resulted in a renewed political focus on energy security it has also laid bare the financial and political consequences of relying on oil & gas imports, giving further impetus to renewables as a secure form of energy. Europe has also sought to be a leading light on the concept of “reaching net zero”, with the European Union (EU) having set out its ambition, back in 2019, to become the world’s first major economic bloc to be climate-neutral by 2050. This has added momentum to energy investment and M&A over recent years – 2021 and 2022 saw the second and third highest annual aggregate values of Western European M&A in the sector on record, at USD 59.8bn and USD 53.7bn, respectively, bested only by the anomalously high total of USD 89.4bn logged in 2018. Energy M&A in the region has been more subdued in 2023, but our survey demonstrates that energy executives are gearing up for a more active dealmaking period, with most expecting more opportunities and anticipating increased levels of investment in the year ahead. Capital looks set to continue to flow primarily to renewable energy projects and related assets, with solar and batteries topping the list of attractive subsectors among our respondents. Consistent with this, South West Europe takes pole position as the most promising region for investment opportunities. But there are thorns among the roses. Our respondents are cognizant of the challenges in the energy market, with supply-chain volatility and commodity price increases emerging as a prominent concern. This is unsurprising after a period of dislocation following the pandemic and amid a time of rising global demand for renewable products and commodities. Persistent inflation and elevated interest rates, combined with an uncertain macroeconomic outlook, are raising investors’ concerns, with financing risk (including the increased cost of financing) also coming to the fore for respondents. Overall, while some sense a recent softening of the market due to these fundamentals, our survey paints a picture of steadily improving investor sentiment in Europe’s energy sector, laying the foundations for a busier period ahead for M&A activity.
27/09/2023
Long-awaited field development approval for Rosebank field
The owners of the Rosebank field have today obtained regulatory consent for the development of the field.Rosebank BackgroundThe Rosebank field was discovered in 2004 and is the UK’s largest undeveloped...
14/09/2023
Energy Transition 2023
As the world seeks to balance energy security and affordability with the broadly agreed imperative to address carbon emissions, this report seeks to provide a timely update on how major oil and gas companies are navigating the energy transition based on an analysis of their published data.