Jun 2011

Low domestic gas pricing restricts spot cargo purchases

The resource could be huge, but Cuadrilla halts drill after tremor

Attorney general Eric Schneiderman filed suit over failure to study environmental effects

Decision on the British Columbia shale may come in 2013

Market woes and procedural headaches ahead as cartel meets in Vienna

Brussels tightens sanctions regime; Direct trade with Tripoli targeted

The company has shut a pipeline to Kansas after a leak which could harm its Keystone plans

Forest fires in northern Alberta are causing a three-week delay

Conventional sewage plants are ill equipped to recycle water

Operators play down fears as Senate vote looms

The Polish Geological Institute says much more geological shale basin research is needed

An increase in crude stocks and disappointing US jobs data contribute to falls

THE UK’s Health and Safety Executive (HSE) this morning launched an investigation into last night’s fatal explosion at Chevron’s 220,000 barrel a day Pembroke refinery in southwest Wales.

IEA sees unconventional future depending on wider acceptance

A Dutch judge today asked Cairn Energy why it had not made public the oil-spill response plan it prepared for the Greenland government ahead of this year’s Arctic drilling campaign

Questions remain over whether Europe can effect a similar transformation to US

Statoil is in talks about changes to its long-term, oil-indexed gas contracts after coming under pressure to include a greater spot price element, Rune Bjørnson, the Norwegian firm’s senior vice president for gas said today

Pledge to close environmental loopholes in the oil-sands sector angers provincial government

Rising costs at Imperial's Kearl project hint at further oil-sands cost inflation

Capital costs declined 3.6% over the past year

The hurdles facing European shale-gas development are as great as their potential to meet the continent’s demand

Upstream projects in the pipeline put Shell on track to meet its targets, but political risk in countries such as Iraq and Kazakhstan could derail its plans

Naimi dubs Opec meeting "one of worst ever"

The worldwide chemicals business has bounced back from its recession – and US producers are set for a resurgence on new feedstock availability

The chemicals business is in a powerful up-cycle as the market fundamentals turn favourable

Gazprom chairman Alexei Miller has another five years at the helm of the world’s largest gas producer and he has big plans for growth

Opec’s Gulf states hold the aces – spare oil-production capacity – in a high-risk, high-profile spat between its members. Derek Brower reports from Vienna

Hearings into an application for a 20-year export permit opened on 8 June

Canada's oilfield services providers are feeling uncharacteristically cheerful, as the once-battered sector recovers from a difficult recession and the lowest activity levels in a decade

The company expects to produce 500,000 barrels a day (b/d) by 2021

EPA raised concerns over wetlands and full-cycle greenhouse-gas emissions

US ambassador backs increased Canadian oil-sands imports

The supermajor paid $1.69 billion for the companies both based in Pennsylvania

Acquisition numbers more than 13,000 net acres for $1,650 an acre

No consensus or decision on increasing oil output

FORECAST high summer demand pushed liquefied natural gas (LNG) prices up this week, although deals were yet to be done above $14/million British thermal units (Btu), market sources said

SOUTH Hook Gas (SHG) is looking to boost UK liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports through the South Hook terminal, managing director Rashid Al-Marri told Petroleum Economist

Sanctions, fuel shortages and Nato attacks have taken their toll. Qadhafi’s departure is imminent

Libya's rebels have found a way to export oil through a pipeline to Tobruk

50% stake in Talisman Energy’s shale assets for more than C$1 billion

Peru’s oil and gas industry must wait to see if President-elect Humala follows up on his promises of radical energy-sector reform

With the start-up of the Peru LNG project, the first in south America, gas exports will bring long-term economic benefits for the country, says Rafael Segovia*

With the petrochemicals business in an up cycle and gas prices low, oil majors and chemicals firms are looking to boost US ethylene capacity

Scottish Power plans to raise domestic UK gas and electricity prices by 19% and 10%

DECC moots help to carry out preliminary exploration work

Global economy "out of the woods"; "$100/b oil is reasonable"; "Saudi Arabia needs Opec", says the cartel’s secretary general, Abdalla El-Badri

No return to Libya until Muammar Qadhafi is removed from power

"The most important piece of kit we need will not be there," says Warrego CEO

With three LNG projects now on the table, Canadian shale-gas producers are pushing hard for exports to Asian markets

Brent front-month prices were choppy above $113/b

CBM Asia Development finds 230 feet of net coal in Indonesia

Winning bid of €30 million ($42.9 million) for the 4,400 square km parcel

Non-binding bid for 20% in shale-gas assets from unnamed US company

For European shale-gas development to live up to its potential, the industry must overcome three significant obstacles

Greenpeace’s international director, Kumi Naidoo, this morning boarded the semi-submersible drilling rig operating off Greenland for Cairn Energy, in breach of an injunction granted to the Edinburgh-based explorer last week

Doubts rise over Australian gas-export projects, as Woodside defers Pluto LNG start-up again

Is the crude oil market on the verge of another spectacular collapse? There are seven good reasons to believe a sell-off is on the way

Protest set to take place outside the Canadian High Commission in London on 18 June

Omran Abukraa has been appointed chairman of Libya’s state-owned National Oil Company

Two discoveries made in June seem set to give Uganda’s oil reserves another lift, while Tullow, Total and CNOOC hammer out their Lake Albert development plans

Contractual force majeure provisions must be analysed in detail, risks and liabilities identified, and management strategies developed

‘Unattractively low’ prices deter unconventional-gas development, as imports and subsidies rise

Joint venture worth C$5.4 billion ($5.5 billion) to develop Encana’s Cutbank Ridge tight-gas assets in British Columbia (BC) and Alberta falls apart

A trio of discoveries in the deep-water Gulf of Mexico (GOM) represent a huge advance in the industry’s struggle to revitalise the prolific basin in the aftermath of Deepwater Horizon

After failing to clinch a gas-pipeline contract with China’s CNPC last week, Gazprom will press ahead with a gas-liquefaction project on the Russian Pacific coast targeting Chinese markets, among others

Hydrocarbon riches do not have to be a curse. Properly managed under predictable rules, Poland’s shale-gas resources can bring social and economic benefits to the country and the EU

Rising unconventional oil supply threatens further market disruption for North America

PetroChina has reassessed its investment plans in Canada, and decided against further development of North American gas

Canada's Flint Energy Services signs construction contract for MEG Energy's Christina Lake thermal oil-sands project in Alberta

Should the project prove commercially viable, it would be “one of the largest projects in BP's portfolio"

The IEA’s release of crude from strategic stocks is less about Libya than about the global economy – and it should send oil prices tumbling

According to the latest BP Statistical Review of World Energy, Canada has fallen behind Venezuela in the oil-reserves ranking

Reduced Canadian exports push WTI up, as the storm over the Keystone XL rumbles on

There are fresh concerns about the US economy as crude prices drop quickly

Regulatory approval is received to process natural gas liquids from unconventional shale plays in western Canada

The Kearl oil-sands project received its first permits to begin moving process modules

Planning to focus on its core areas, Connacher Oil and Gas sets out to sell almost 25,000 acres of oil-sands leases

German gas buyers are still playing the spot market, despite concerns over long-term energy supply following the country’s decision to phase out nuclear power stations

Improvements to Canada’s upstream fiscal terms have left the US in its wake

Poland may revise its favourable upstream tax regime when shale-gas production takes off

The UK Tar Sands Network (TSN) has admitted the anti-oil sands debate isn’t as clear cut as it thought, after organising a protest against fuel derived from Canadian bitumen

Political problems in Libya, and the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan have both put a dent in global gas supply

Transocean has been accused of dodging tax on NKr10 billion ($1.8 billion) of revenue in Norway

Inpex has signed sales agreements for the Australian LNG project

Alubaf International Bank Tunis is providing a letter of credit to traders willing to break an embargo on supplies of fuel to parts of Libya still under Muammar Qadhafi’s control

Thailand may have to quadruple liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports after a gas leak cut supplies from its Plathong offshore field in the Gulf of Thailand

Calgary-based oil and gas explorer Niko Resources has pleaded guilty to bribery in only the second case of its kind in Canada

Qatargas has signed a 20-year supply deal with Argentina’s state-owned Enarsa for deliveries of 5 million tonnes a year (t/y) of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from 2014. The price is likely to be linked to oil, not the US gas market

China approves licencing of four blocks to a series of domestic companies

Conscious of public concern and criticism of fracking’s environmental impact, companies are improving transparency and cleaning up their act

Athabasca Oil Sands says its net resource volumes rose by 10% in the past year, as it strives to reach commercial production

Shell Canada has reached terms with the governments of Canada and oil-producing Alberta province to help fund its C$1.3 billion Quest carbon capture and storage (CCS) project

Alberta investigates explosion and pipeline leak

Petrobank raises its estimate of contingent bitumen at May River

Chief Oil & Gas to be fined by Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection

$1.8 billion investment deal planned over seven years