(EnergyAsia, July 21 2014, Monday) — As its resources-dependent economy began to take off at the start of the decade, Mongolia was repeatedly warned to guard against the “resource curse” associated with corruption, waste, internal power struggle, runaway inflation and political instability that has befallen many developing economies. But, Mongolian leaders paid little heed as...

(EnergyAsia, July 18 2014, Friday) — Citing Iraq’s worsening violence, the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) said it has slashed its forecast for the country’s crude oil production by 600,000 b/d to between 3.1 million b/d and 3.2 million b/d from now through end-2015. The escalation of violence in northern Iraq that started in June...

(EnergyAsia, July 15 2014, Tuesday) — Iraq is losing hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue as warring factions led by ethnic Kurds and Sunni revolutionaries cash in on sales of crude and oil products seized from producing fields and refineries previously controlled by Baghdad. Last week, Kurdish troops took over two oilfields in northern...

(EnergyAsia, July 14 2014, Monday) — Iraq’s plans to store and trade crude oil in South Korea to serve its Asian customers have been thrown into doubt by the growing geopolitical crisis in the Middle East. Iraq had planned to store about four million barrels of its crude oil in Yeosu terminal according to oil...

(EnergyAsia, July 10 2014, Thursday) — With a nervous eye on its growing exposure to the Middle East, China’s envoy to the region arrived in Baghdad this week to make a high-profile declaration of support for the Iraqi government fighting to hold the country together against the twin break-up threats posed by the Islamic State...

(EnergyAsia, July 9 2014, Wednesday) — North America’s energy boom notwithstanding, the US will remain engaged in the Middle East while China will grow increasingly dependent on the region for its oil and gas supplies, said consultant Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited (DTTL). In its 2014 Oil and Gas Reality Check report, Deloitte said the US’s...

(EnergyAsia, July 8 2014, Tuesday) — Mongolia’s economy will experience slower growth over the next three years as it struggles to adjust to persistently high inflation and balance of payment problems that began since the start of the decade, said the World Bank. Real GDP % 2011    2012     2013     2014f     2015f   ...

(EnergyAsia, July 7 2014, Monday) — Three months after agreeing to form a joint venture firm, a group of Mongolian companies and China’s Shenhua Energy are still working out the details for cross-border rail links to serve the coal trade between the two countries. In April, China’s leading coal miner formed a joint venture with...

(EnergyAsia, July 4 2014, Friday) — Singapore’s oil trading and refining industry  has begun a steady decline as it confronts limits to growth imposed by land scarcity, rising business cost and safety concerns over congestion of the nation’s heavily used sea channels to handle oil, gas and other merchandise shipments. After more than 50 years...

(EnergyAsia, July 3 2014, Thursday) — Philippines-based Jetti Petroleum Inc expects to start up its new fuel storage facility in Bataan province on Luzon Island in October. Construction of the one-billion-peso terminal to store gasoline, diesel, fuel oil and ethanol in Mariveles municipality to serve the province’s growing fuel demand is more than half completed....

(EnergyAsia, July 2 2014, Wednesday) — With the worsening conflicts in Iraq and Syria casting uncertainty over Middle East oil supplies, the International Energy Agency (IEA) has retained its latest forecast for 2014’s global oil demand to 92.76 million b/d. This implies a rise of about 1.45% over last year’s consumption of 91.43 million b/d...

(EnergyAsia, July 1 2014, Tuesday) — Buoyed by an improved reading of the world economy, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) has returned to issuing bullish forecasts for global oil demand growth with its June report predicting record consumption over the next two years. The world will consume 91.79 million this year and 93.12 million b/d...

(EnergyAsia, June 30 2014, Monday) — The International Energy Agency (IEA) has served notice that it may lower its medium-term forecast for Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) production amid the worsening geopolitical situation in the Middle East, with Iraq effectively plunged into civil war. The agency and other analysts have long pinned their hopes...

(EnergyAsia, June 26 2014, Thursday) — Chinese state-owned companies are plodding away in talks with their counterparts in Kuwait and Ecuador to jointly develop two major oil refinery projects. Sinopec and Kuwait Petroleum Co (KPC) expect to start up an integrated oil refinery-petrochemical complex in China’s southern Guangdong province by 2017 while China National Petroleum...

(EnergyAsia, June 25 2014, Wednesday) — Fresh from signing a world-record gas-supply deal with China, Russia’s Gazprom is expanding ties with India through new agreements to increase the supply of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and to jointly develop upstream projects. The Russian firm’s Singapore-based subsidiary, Gazprom Marketing & Trading, will raise the annual supply of...

(EnergyAsia, June 24 2014, Tuesday) — Will rising oil prices crimp global demand growth, stimulate supply and hurt global economic growth? As Brent surged to a nine-month-high of more than US$115 a barrel in response to the latest outbreak of conflicts in the Middle East, the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) may have to...

(EnergyAsia, June 23 2014, Monday) — Royal Dutch Shell’s sharply reduced 4.5% stake holding in Australian upstream firm Woodside following last week’s sale of 156.54 million shares will give both companies a freer hand to decide on their respective investment strategies. The sale will ease more than a decade of tensions between the two companies...

(EnergyAsia, June 20 2014, Friday) — Driven by China, Asia’s energy demand will grow at five times the rate of North America’s by five times between 2014 and 2030, predicts UK-based consultant Wood Mackenzie. This is equal to adding a new Brazil to global energy demand every year over that 16-year period, but global supply...

(EnergyAsia, June 18 2014, Tuesday) — A day after cutting off natural gas supplies to Ukraine, Russia’s Gazprom celebrated the listing of its shares on the Singapore stock exchange. The listing underlines Gazprom’s pivot towards the world’s fast-growing economies, giving it access to capital from the region’s cash-flush investors barely a month after it had...

(EnergyAsia, June 16 2014,  Monday) — Following the boom in North America, the natural gas industry will experience a “golden age” of demand and supply growth in China over the next five years to 2019, predicts the International Energy Agency (IEA). In its latest Medium-Term Gas Market Report, the Paris-based agency said Chinese natural gas...

(EnergyAsia, June 12 2014, Thursday) — The world will face the twin threats of rising oil prices and production cost in its quest to develop hydrocarbon reserves to meet growing energy demand, said the International Energy Agency (IEA). It estimates that over the next two decades to 2035, the world will have to invest a...

(EnergyAsia, June 10 2014, Tuesday) — Central Asia is increasing efforts to export natural gas to China, with four fully operating pipelines expected to nearly triple delivery to 80 billion cubic metres per year by 2020. Two pipelines, A and B, are currently delivering a total of 30 bcm/year from Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, while line...

(EnergyAsia, June 6 2014, Friday) — The oil refining industry in Thailand is joining its counterparts in Australia, Singapore and Japan in beating a retreat as it feels the competitive pressure from much larger and more sophisticated plants in the Middle East, China and India. State-owned PTT is planning to sell off its holdings in...

(EnergyAsia, June 5 2014, Thursday) — Asia must better plan and prepare for potential oil shocks and supply disruptions as its rapid energy demand growth shows no signs of slowing down, said two recent studies. US ratings agency S&P said Asia’s energy deficit will continue to rise with its energy imports reaching a record 40%...

(EnergyAsia, June 3 2014, Tuesday) — The decline of Singapore’s once-mighty oil refining industry looks set to continue despite hitting a new low with Shell recently writing off the US$2.3 billion value of its 500,000 b/d plant. At its peak in the 1990s, the giant Bukom Island refinery was described as the crown jewel of...