(EnergyAsia, October 26, Monday) — Australia’s Marstel Terminals plans to invest up to A$10 million to rehabilitate and redevelop eight bulk storage tanks at Bundaberg Port in Queensland state that have been unused for five years. (US$1=A$1.08). The tanks were in relatively good condition when Marstel acquired them from Mobil Oil Australia in September last...
(EnergyAsia, October 26, Monday) — Government support for Chinese and South Korean shipbuilders is having a negative impact on the global shipbuilding industry which is already reeling from slumping vessel prices and freight rates. Industry officials warn that the world’s two largest shipbuilding countries are disregarding weak market condition and are set to flood the...
(EnergyAsia, October 26, Monday) — US major Chevron Corp said Apache Julimar Pty Ltd, a subsidiary of US-based Apache Corp, and KUFPEC Australia (Julimar) Pty Ltd, a subsidiary of the Kuwait Foreign Petroleum Exploration Company ksc, have joined its Wheatstone liquefied natural gas (LNG) project as natural gas suppliers and 25% equity partners in the...
(EnergyAsia, October 23, Friday) — EOC Limited, a Singapore-based operator of offshore construction and floating production vessels, said its first floating, production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel, the Lewek Arunothai, has begun full production in the Gulf of Thailand. The vessel has also been accepted by its client, a listed state-owned upstream company supplying oil...
(EnergyAsia, October 23, Friday) — Hengyang Petrochemical Logistics Limited, a petrochemical storage and transportation services provider in China’s Yangtze Delta region, said its recent initial public offering of 18 million new shares at S$0.38 each was fully subscribed. The company said the IPO raised approximately S$6.8 million as a result of the strong interest shown...
(EnergyAsia, October 23, Friday) — Singapore’s state industrial landlord JTC Corp is deciding over whether to build large floating oil storage facilities or reclaim more land to address the problem of space shortage on the oil and petrochemicals hub of Jurong Island. An earlier study by JTC showed that establishing a very large floating structure...
(EnergyAsia, October 23, Friday) — As a sign of the continuing weakeness in the shipbuilding market, Cosco Corporation (Singapore) Limited, a subsidiary of China Ocean Shipping (Group) Company, has deferred instalment payments for a client for the construction of another vessel. Cosco said that its 51%-owned subsidiary, Cosco Nantong, has agreed to accept payment upon...
(EnergyAsia, October 23, Friday) — Chevron Philippines is planning to either build a regional crude oil storage and blending facility or a 300-MW natural gas-fired power plant on its 120-hectare San Pascual, Batangas property south of Manila city. The investment decision is being studied following the government’s 25-year renewal of Chevron’s lease of various parcels...
(EnergyAsia, October 23, Friday) — The world’s oil companies are expected to invest $360 billion in offshore oil projects by 2013, up from $260 billion last year as delayed projects come back on stream from 2011, said consultants Douglas Westwood. The company said deep-water drilling in particular will see strong growth as offshore oil is...
(EnergyAsia, October 23, Friday) — State oil giant PetroChina has begun building a 470-million yuan Tunli oil depot in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in southwestern China. (US$1=6.83 yuan). Construction of the 310,000-cubic metre depot in Guangxi’s capital city of Nanning is scheduled to be finished by next April. The project will support PetroChina’s 10-million-tonne oil...
(EnergyAsia, October 22, Thursday) — Vietnam’s Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has approved a national programme to begin stockpiling crude oil and refined products by 2015. The government has allocated US$2.4 billion for the project’s first phase to 2015, and another US$7.2 billion in the second phase to 2025. State PetroVietnam is expected to take...
(EnergyAsia, October 22, Thursday) — EOC Limited, a Singapore-based operator of offshore construction and floating production vessels, has landed its biggest contract to date worth US$1 billion to provide support services to Premier Oil producing oil in Vietnam’s Chim Sao offshore field. EOC will provide the UK company the services of its floating production, storage...
(EnergyAsia, October 22, Thursday) — Post-war Sri Lanka recently suffered its worst power failure after a major transmission line linking Colombo from Kolonnawa to the Kelanitissa power complex suffered a cable break, said state power firm Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB). Apologising for the massive power shutdown across much of the island, CEB chairman E. Edirisinghe...
(EnergyAsia, October 22, Thursday) — Hedge fund investor logi Energy LLC said it has launched ‘The Peak Oil Value Fund’, the first of its kind aimed at institutional and accredited investors. logi Energy said it aims to support the efforts of oil and gas exploration firms aiming to boost their reserves, and to help the...
(EnergyAsia, October 22, Thursday) — India’s Reliance Industries said it plans to expand its 580,000 b/d refinery in Gujarat state by another 20% by mid-2010. The refinery, sited next to an older 660,000 b/d plant in Jamnagar port, started up last December, and has been operating at well above nameplate capacity. Reliance officials said they...
(EnergyAsia, October 22, Thursday) — The 7.6-magnitude earthquake that struck West Sumatra in Indonesia on September 30 did not disrupt the supply of piped gas from South Sumatra to Singapore. More than 1,000 people in Sumatra were believed to have been killed from the quake’s deadly impact. In Singapore, given that 80% of its electricity...
(EnergyAsia, October 22, Thursday) — China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) said it has awarded subsidiary China Petroleum Engineering Construction Corporation (CPECC) contracts worth a total of $260 million to work on seven engineering procurement and construction (EPC) projects in Sudan’s Block 6. Operator CNPC, which is leading the block’s development, said CPECC will build two...
(EnergyAsia, October 22, Thursday) — Shell China Limited, a unit of the Anglo Dutch major, said it and its partners recently opened their 10th retail station in Xi’an city in Shaanxi Province. Shaanxi Yanchang and Shell Petroleum Company Limited is a joint venture between Shaanxi Yanchang Petroleum Group Co Ltd, Shaanxi Tianli Investment Company Limited...
(EnergyAsia, October 21, Wednesday) — The Shell group has awarded separate contracts to two Singapore-listed engineering companies, Hai Leck Holdings Limited and PEC Limited. Hai Leck said its wholly-owned subsidiary, Hai Leck Engineering Pte Ltd, was awarded new maintenance contracts by Shell Eastern Petroleum (Pte) Ltd (SEPL) and Shell Chemicals Seraya (Pte) Ltd (SCSL) to...
(EnergyAsia, October 21, Wednesday) — US and European oil refiners are facing the twin threats of declining domestic demand and growing competition from Asian rivals, said Vienna, Austria-based energy consultant JBC Energy. Some operators may be forced to shut down as they will not be able to compete against some of Asia’s larger, newer and...
(EnergyAsia, October 21, Wednesday) — The Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) has raised its forecast for the world’s oil demand for 2009 and 2010 in light of the improving economic outlook. In its latest monthly report, OPEC said: “With the US oil demand bouncing back from a steep historical decline, the forecast for 2009...
(EnergyAsia, October 21, Wednesday) — US crude oil futures briefly rose to a new 12-month above the $80-per-barrel barrier yesterday, helped by rising investor confidence and the continued slump in the value of the US dollar. With OPEC, the IEA and the US EIA all revising upwards their forecasts for world oil demand this and...
(EnergyAsia, October 21, Wednesday) — The cost of operating ships rose nearly 16% last year due primarily to rising crew wages, according to leading shipping and insurance adviser, Moore Stephens. The consultancy said its operating costs and benchmarking tool, OpCost 2009, covering several vessel types rose by 15.8%. Crew wages rose on average at a...
(EnergyAsia, October 21, Wednesday) — The Iranian government has approved a plan to sell 40% of state-owned Iranian Oil Terminals Company to the private sector. The company, part of the National Iranian Oil Company, owns and operates four storage terminals that load more than 2,000 oil carrier tankers per year. The partial privatisation would cover...
(EnergyAsia, October 21, Wednesday) — NYSE-listed Occidental Petroleum Corporation said it has agreed to acquire oil and gas trading unit Phibro LLC from Citigroup Inc for “approximately net asset value” of about $250 million Occidental said Phibro’s assets consist of cash, marketable securities and readily saleable commodity positions, and does not trade in any exotic...