(EnergyAsia, January 30, Wednesday) — Japan is paying record prices for its imported liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports from Australia, Brunei, Malaysia and Indonesia as it struggles to meet rising demand to make up for power shortfalls at its nuclear plants. The recent spot purchases will lead to higher LNG prices for the rest of...
(EnergyAsia, January 30, Wednesday) — China’s Suntech Power said it is participating in a solar-energy system constructed for the roof of the town hall in Genk in Belgium.The project was engineered by Netherlands-based Oskomera Solar Power Solutions (OSPS) in collaboration with Belgium-based ENECO Energie. The system consists of approximately 1,260 Suntech solar modules with a...
(EnergyAsia, January 30, Wednesday) — BP will supply feedstocks to Jurong Aromatics Corp (JAC) and buy back the finished products in a US$10 billion agreement.The feedstock from the Middle East will be used in JAC’s new US$2 billion aromatics plant due to come onstream on Jurong Island in 2011. Construction is expected to start in...
(EnergyAsia, January 30, Wednesday) — Japanese oil refiner Nippon Oil has agreed to become an ‘emergency’ crude oil supplier to New Zealand under a special deal recently signed with the Wellington.The agreement allows New Zealand to buy supplies from Japan through a ‘ticket contract’ system which provides the government with an option to purchase crude...
(EnergyAsia, January 30, Wednesday) — India’s Essar Shipping Limited has announced a plan to re-organise and consolidate the business of other businesses within the Essar group.It is exploring the option of merging its port and terminal assets with the drilling and exploration business of Essar Oilfields Services Limited.The ESL board has passed a resolution to...
(EnergyAsia, January 29, Tuesday) — BP has signed a series of agreements to increase its investments in China covering clean energy research, a wind power project and chemical production. BP signed an agreement to undertake a feasibility study to jointly build a Clean Energy Commercialisation Centre (CECC) with China Academy of Sciences (CAS). This follows (more…)
(EnergyAsia, January 29, Tuesday) — Indonesian state oil and gas firm Pertamina plans to invest US$2.2 billion this year to boost crude output and upgrade its refineries. The bulk or 62% of the funds will be spent on upstream projects with the remainder to be invested in the downstream and refining business. Indonesia, an OPEC...
(EnergyAsia, January 29, Tuesday) — China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), the country’s largest crude oil producer, is laying the foundation for future growth with investments in four large refinery projects this year. The plants at Dalian, Fushun, Dushanzi and Qinzhou will provide the company with more than 40 million tonnes of refining capacity. The first...
(EnergyAsia, January 29, Tuesday) — China is offering to build a direct rail link to supply oil products to the energy-starved Himalayan nation of Nepal. The link would extend the Tibet railway system from Lhasa to the Nepalese capital of Kathmandu. In Nepal, hydropower helps meet the bulk of domestic electricity demand. But only a...
(EnergyAsia, January 29, Tuesday) — Essar Energy Overseas Ltd, a subsidiary of India’s Essar Oil Limited, has agreed to acquire 50% of Kenya Petroleum Refineries Ltd (KPRL) which owns a four-million-metric-tonne-a-year oil refinery in Kenya’s Mombasa city. The Kenyan government holds the other 50%. Essar said it will acquire the stake from existing shareholders Shell...
(EnergyAsia, January 29, Tuesday) — Africa’s oil refiners will meet at the third annual meeting of the African Oil Refiners (ARA) event in Cape Town in South Africa from March 10 to 12. They will discuss product quality and health issues, and focus on meeting the challenges of competition from new refineries in India and...
(EnergyAsia, January 29, Tuesday) — The Dubai Mercantile Exchange Limited said it has been given permission by the Dubai Financial Services Authority to accept privately negotiated ‘block trades’ of Oman crude oil futures contracts from January 14. ‘Block’ trades of a minimum size of 100 contracts can be submitted to the exchange via the NYMEX (more…)
(EnergyAsia, January 29, Tuesday) — Expect oil prices to remain strong this year as world demand growth continues at a brisk pace while inventories decline further and production struggles to keep pace, said the International Energy Agency (IEA). The Paris-based oil watchdog for the industralised world said oil consumption in China, India and the Middle...
(EnergyAsia, January 29, Tuesday) — Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao said his government will freeze soaring energy prices in the near term to check an 11-year-high inflationary rate caused by rising food and oil costs. Prices of fuel, oil products, natural gas and electricity along with water tariffs and public transportation fees would be frozen,...
(EnergyAsia, January 29, Tuesday) — The Multi Commodity Exchange (MCX), India’s biggest commodity exchange, has become the first in Asia and among a few around the world to launch futures trading in carbon credits (ECX-CFI MiniSM). Carbon credits are generated by organisations and companies in the developing world using cleaner technologies, thus reducing their greenhouse...
(EnergyAsia, January 28, Monday) — Jusung Engineering, a South Korean semiconductor, display and solar cell device manufacturer, has signed an agreement with research institute French Atomic Energy Authority (CEA) to jointly develop silicon-based heterojunction solar cells until at least the end of 2009. The partners will combine their expertise to develop specific thin film (more…)
(EnergyAsia, January 28, Monday) — OCBC Investment Research Pte Ltd has rated the stock of Singapore-listed oil and gas engineering firm Federal International as a buy, despite lowering its fair value price to S$0.81 from $1.02 previously. (US$1=S$1.43). OCBC said weaker market sentiments around the world will increase volatility in share prices. As market and...
(EnergyAsia, January 28, Monday) — China’s upstream company CNOOC expects to start up its new 12-million-tonne-per-year refinery in Huizhou in southeastern Guangdong province later this year. The plant is capable of producing 7.3 million tons of oil products to meet the demand of the province’s fast growing oil market. The company is planning on building...
(EnergyAsia, January 28, Monday) — Residents in remote areas of the Philippines with limited access to electricity may see light at the end of the tunnel with new financial support from Japan and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) that targets electric cooperatives. Electric cooperatives, small distribution utilities in which all users own shares, are (more…)
(EnergyAsia, January 28, Monday) — Shell’s CEO Jeroen van der Veer appears to have endorsed the ‘peak oil’ view when he wrote that “easily accessible supplies of oil and gas probably will no longer keep up with demand” after 2015. In an article released during last week’s World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland last week...
(EnergyAsia, January 28, Monday) — Nasdaq-listed Fuel Tech Inc, a world leader in advanced engineering solutions for the optimisation of combustion systems in utility and industrial applications, said it has awarded its first FUEL CHEM® demonstration programme in China. The company said it will share with Itochu Hong Kong Ltd, a subsidiary of Japan’s Itochu...
(EnergyAsia, January 28, Monday) — McCloskey’s Asian Coal Conference 2008 will focus on the region’s rise as the centre of the world coal market, with China s the driving force. This year’s event will be held on at the Shangri-La Hotel in Singapore on February 26-27. Asia led the coal world markets last year. (more…)
(EnergyAsia, January 28, Monday) — Keppel Shipyard Limited, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Singapore’s Keppel Offshore & Marine Limited (Keppel O&M), said it has been awarded a S$145 million contract for the integration and completion of a new build “Bully” drillship. Keppel was awarded the contract by a company jointly owned by Frontier Drilling and Shell....
(EnergyAsia, January 28, Monday) — US commodities trader Fimat expects world oil prices to take a “pause” this year after the recent run-up to record levels. WTI oil futures have gone through a roller coaster, falling 12% in three weeks from an all-time nominal high of $100.09 on January 4 after surging 44% from August...
(EnergyAsia, January 28, Monday) — Australia’s Nexus Energy Limited said it has agreed to take over Anzon Australia Limited (AZA) and Anzon Energy Limited (AEL) to create a leader in the country’s upstream oil and gas sector. Nexus said it will acquire both AZA and AEL by way of separate, non-interdependent schemes of arrangement. Nexus...