Michel Tenaille - Vice-President of SN REPAL

Born in 1907 in Mapple Creek, French Canadian, geologist by training. After studying at the Sorbonne (Bachelor of Science), where he met Robert Laffitte, and at the National Higher School of Petroleum, he joined Morocco; it is associated with discoveries of shale deposits. In 1942, he became head of the petroleum department of the Syndicate of Mining Research in Algeria (SRMA), created in 1941 by Armand Colot. He joined SN Repal as chief geologist soon after its creation; he is in particular the head of the mission - famous - which crosses the Sahara in November 1948, with the main geologists of the time (Menchikoff, Laffitte, Bruderer, ...). He led the creation of the Aumale Oil Company, which discovered a little oil at Oued Gueterini, the first real discovery of Saharan oil (1948). Appointed general manager alongside R. Goetze in 1955, then vice-president of REPAL, then president of SOPEFAL under the aegis of ASCOOP (Cooperative Association for Petroleum Research and Exploitation) following the agreements Franco-Algerian oil companies, because the new president (Belkacem Nabi) is keen to pursue the development of Saharan deposits with the teams that have the skills. Director attached to the DGEP of Elf-ERAP in 1971, it is he who, with Sid Ahmed Ghozali, CEO of Sonatrach, settles the litigation resulting from the nationalization of Algerian workers decided in February 1971, because he is president of the Sofretal. He was also president of the SAP (African Oil Company) in the early 1960s, and played a role in the creation of the SAR (African Refining Company), of which he was CEO until 1975, the year of his death.