Feb 2012

With three LNG-export projects in the pipeline, Australia’s Woodside faces some tough decisions as costs and complications escalate

Colombia is turning to its nascent unconventional oil and gas sector in a bid to attract new investors and sustain growth in its booming oil and gas industry

Activity in Australia’s emerging Cooper basin shale-gas play has shifted up a gear

China-focused unconventional explorer Sino Gas and Energy is set to benefit from the country’s latest coal-bed methane (CBM) initiatives, announcing a large increase in its resource base

Companies are queuing up for potential US LNG exports, but domestic consumers are worried about the impact on Henry Hub gas prices

Crude prices continue to trade in a narrow range above $110 a barrel, as bearish data from the US failed to soften oil markets

Canada’s two largest oil-sands producers have reported significant jumps in 2011 profits

Parliament has banned hydraulic fracturing (fracking) in Bulgaria, making it the second European country, after France, to impose a moratorium on the technique

ExxonMobil is assessing its options after its two initial shale-gas wells in Poland – Siennica-1 and Krupe-1 – failed to flow commercial gas volumes

Gazprom reduces gas supply to Europe amid freezing temperatures

CNOOC puts new deep-water drilling campaign at centre of bullish output targets

Petroplus collapsed into administration in January, dashing hopes for the low-cost business model favoured by the independents and underlining the troubles in Europe's refining sector

UK gas jumps above Russian oil-linked and Asian LNG prices

The UK’s 27th licensing round, thrown open on 1 February, offers explorers their choice of 2,800 blocks covering virtually the entire unlicensed offshore

Gazprom reduces gas supply, highlighting opportunity for shale-gas energy security

Canada’s largest in situ oil-sands project, at Cold Lake, Alberta, is about to grow bigger. Owner Imperial Oil has formally sanctioned a C$2 billion ($2 billion) expansion

The Alberta and federal governments are introducing a new environmental-monitoring progamme for the oil sands, but is it enough?

India’s Reliance Industries is primed to pump 3.5 million cubic metres a day (cm/d) of gas from two coal-bed methane (CBM) blocks in central India by the second half of 2014

Shell has reiterated its bullish position on China’s shale-gas potential, as it plans to ramp up drilling for the unconventional resource in the country – the world’s biggest energy consumer

Venezuela’s state-owned PdV is on track to start production at a number of heavy-oil projects this year in the Orinoco Belt

Statoil has chosen a bold development plan for its Luva deep-water gasfield, which will see construction of a new gas-landing pipeline in northern waters and the country’s first use of a spar deep-water platform

Record investment in UK North Sea gasfields could reverse a decade-long downward production trend, according to consultancy Wood Mackenzie

Setbacks at ExxonMobil’s first two shale-gas wells in Poland haven’t deterred the supermajor

Development work in the North Sea’s Utsira High area – where the vast Johan Sverdrup oilfield is under appraisal – is gathering pace

Shell and PetroChina blaze shale-gas export path to Asia

With Brent trading at an 18-month high, the oil market’s bulls appear to have good reasons to celebrate. But the long-term outlook is far more troubling. A steep correction is on the cards

Europe’s big freeze – and Gazprom’s inability to meet the spike in gas demand – illustrates the challenges and inherent complexities the Russian gas firm faces

The glut of crude oil at the US’ Cushing hub and a strong Canadian dollar are putting an increasing strain on Alberta’s oil-sands producers

London-listed San Leon Energy is riding high on positive exploration results from two of its Polish shale-gas wells in as many days

ExxonMobil is pressing ahead with unconventional-gas exploration in Germany, despite opposition from environmental activists and a moratorium on hydraulic fracturing (fracking) in North Rhine-Westphalia

BG Group is primed to expand its $15 billion Queensland Curtis coal-bed methane (CBM) to liquefied natural gas (LNG) export plant after reporting a huge rise in its Australian gas resources

Don’t write off the US, its oil benchmark, or its currency just yet. The country’s role in the global oil market, said since 2007 to be losing its significance, will be decisive again

Iran’s nuclear ambition remains a threat to global oil markets, but not because of sanctions on its crude exports

A new approach to addressing Malaysia’s declining oil production looks set to bear fruit and Petronas is leading the way with massive upstream spending

In the latest of a series of unplanned oil-sands outages, Canadian Natural Resources (CNRL) has been forced to shut its 110,000 barrels a day (b/d) Horizon mine for more than a month

Total said in mid-February that it would like to invest in Kurdistan’s oil and gas industry, indicating that the Iraqi government’s fourth-round licensing terms were not very attractive

Exploration in the Gulf of Mexico’s Western Gap, which straddles the US/Mexico maritime border, may soon get under way following a landmark deal agreed on 20 February

A year after the Fukushima nuclear disaster, Japan’s atomic future remains in the balance

Despite the huge discoveries, don’t expect unconventional oil and gas to drag Argentina out of its energy-import problem just yet

The Vaca Muerta shale play could transform Argentina’s energy sector. But the government needs a strategy to ensure investment arrives

Under the auspices of the UN, countries laying claim to Arctic territory hope legal international borders can be settled, opening the way for exploration

The Arctic’s potential has long been a lure for explorers. But while some sectors of the region have become proved petroleum provinces other plays are proving harder to tap

Encana strikes unconventional gas deal with Japan’s Mitsubishi as market fundamentals spook shale-gas bulls

ExxonMobil has sounded a note of caution on the scale of Europe’s shale-gas potential and the pace of development, but said some production is possible within five years

US shale oil could alter the global crude market, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said, just as shale gas changed the world’s gas markets

US independent EOG Resources is crediting its operations in the southern sector of the Eagle Ford shale for boosting fourth quarter operating and financial performance

China's state-run firms may ease up on on their recent asset-buying sprees, as the country’s leaders jostle for position on the politburo and market uncertainty keeps oil prices high, Ashwin Punde, managing director of energy investment banking at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, told the International Petroleum Week conference

Australia’s Origin Energy today announced an increase in proven and probable coal-bed methane (CBM) reserves earmarked for feedstock for the Australia-Pacific Liquefied Natural Gas (APLNG) development, in Australia’s Queensland state, and has hinted it may further reduce its stake in the A$20 billion ($21 billion) project

The Polish government expects to adopt a shale-gas tax framework this year in time to be implemented ahead of expected first commercial production in 2015, government officials said

Australian firm Santos will spend A$20 million ($21 million) to fix what it claims is minor environmental damage from several unreported leaks of contaminated water at coal-bed methane (CBM) projects operated by a firm it acquired last year

Chevron is trying to convince the Bulgarian government to overturn a ban on hydraulic fracturing (fracking) imposed earlier this year on the back of  environmental concerns

A swathe of new liquefied natural gas projects and pricing reform are paving the way for major change in the nation’s gas sector

Failure to agree FQD ban on Alberta crude a rare victory for producers

London-listed Madagascar Oil’s Tsimiroro heavy oil project in Madagascar looks to be getting back on track after a reserves upgrade and successful fundraising on the London markets boosted the company’s cash pile by $26.5 million

Perceptions of tight supply, renewed hopes for the world economy and geopolitical risks associated with Iran have rallied oil prices and buoyed the market, despite growing evidence of a slowdown in global demand growth

World oil supply rose by 90,000 b/d in January, reaching 87.9 million b/d, with a jump in output from Opec more than offsetting a 200,000 b/d decline in production outside the cartel, said the IEA

Ukraine has opened the bidding for exploration rights to two prospective shale-gas areas as part of its push to develop its unconventional gas resources, the country’s State Service for Geology and Mineral Resources said

Shale gas has the potential to help meet India’s rising energy demand, but the sector's development has been stymied by the government’s lack of progress in formulating policy for unconventional resources

A wrangle over coal-bed methane (CBM) pricing has become a flash point between private unconventional operators and India’s oil ministry

US supermajor joins hunt for Argentine shale bounty