Ex Shell Chairman Joins Caithness Board

Caithness Petroleum Limited (“Caithness” or the “Company”), the privately owned British independent petroleum exploration and production company,  announced today the appointment of Peter de Wit, who recently retired as Chairman of Shell Netherlands, as a nonexecutive director of the Company, with effect from 15 September 2011.

Peter, 62, is a Dutch national who has spent most of his 40‐year career with Shell in the downstream oil marketing and natural gas sectors, based at various times in the UK, the USA, the Netherlands and a number of locations in the Far East. A graduate in economics and political science from Trinity College, Dublin, Peter joined Shell in 1971 and worked initially in Shell’s oil marketing and natural gas businesses in Australia, the UK and Nigeria. In the 1980s, he held management roles in Shell’s Australian and Dutch retail oil marketing, and its global gas marketing business in the UK and USA, before moving to London in the mid‐1990s as Vice President Aviation and Marine Products and Vice President‐Commercial of Shell Coal.

In 1998, Peter was appointed Strategy Director for Shell’s Gas and Power division and in 1999 joined this division’s Executive Committee, as Executive Vice President responsible for the Middle East Region. In 2002, he relocated to Singapore to serve as Executive Vice President for the critical Asia Pacific Region, overseeing Shell’s high profile Asian gas business and a number of new LNG and coal gasification projects including in the Russian Far East, Australia and China. At that time he also served as non‐executive Board member of Woodside Petroleum. In 2005, he returned to The Hague as Executive Vice President responsible for Shell’s Global LNG business. From late 2007 until his retirement in May 2011, Peter served as President and Country Chairman, Shell Netherlands.

In addition to his business accountabilities, while based in The Hague, Peter was also responsible for Government relations and represented Shell on numerous boards, industry and government‐sponsored bodies.

Commenting on the appointment, David Donnelly, Chairman, said:

“I am delighted to welcome Peter de Wit to the Board. His extensive international board‐level experience is an excellent complement to the expertise of our other Board members and I look forward to working with him on the next phase of the Company’s development.”

Caithness is a privately owned independent petroleum exploration and production company with  assets onshore Morocco, in the UK North Sea and in Texas, USA.

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Source:Caithness Petroleum ,September 19, 2011;