a key player in the region’s geopolitical manouvering as the fallout from Russia’s military invasion of Georgia continues to play out. At an energy summit in Azerbaijan’s capital of Baku last month, European countries reached a framework deal to strengthen their energy ties with Azerbaijan in a move aimed at undercutting Russia’s role in the...
demand for liquefied natural gas (LNG), mitigating fears of supply shortages amid cancelled or delayed projects. Many LNG export projects around the world have been delayed this year by a variety of factors from rising labour and material costs to falling prices. With oil crashing to a third of their peaks in July, industry observers...
for the construction of very large floating storage (VLFS) tanks to be located in waters around the island. The tanks will be used to store oil in view of the high cost of building a similar structure on land in Singapore. A 300,000-cubic metre VLFS tank would need the equivalent of five hectares of space,...
facility in Fujairah in the UAE by the middle of next year. The 560,000-cubic metre terminal clean oil products terminal will lift Vitol’s total storage capacity at the port to almost 1.1 million cubic metres. Vitol’s US$150 million investment includes new tanks as well as spending on jetty infrastructure and an upgrade to an existing...
(EnergyAsia, December 12, Friday) — Sri Lanka’s state oil firm Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) may default on a oil hedging deal with Standard Chartered Bank. The deal made earlier in the year when oil prices were surging to new record highs could cost the Sri Lankan government millions of dollars. The bank and CPC had...
(EnergyAsia, December 12, Friday) — Cavico Corp, a leading infrastructure company in Vietnam, said its wholly owned subsidiary, Cavico Transportation, has been approved to build a wind farm in Lam Dong province. The Hanoi-based company is studying the construction of a 30 megawatt (MW) wind farm, which will be connected to the national grid upon...
(EnergyAsia, December 12, Friday) — India’s Tata Power is aiming to increase its investments in wind power projects. The company has set a target of raising its wind power capacity to 500 megawatt (MW) by 2011, up from 200 MW now, coinciding with a move to reduce its dependency on coal. But wind power is...
(EnergyAsia, December 12, Friday) — Sandwiched between Europe and the politically volatile resource-rich countries of Central Asia, Turkey is weighing its options that will best secure its energy supplies. One obvious path is to secure more oil supplies from Azerbaijan via the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline. The US$4 billion pipeline ships about one million b/d of...
(EnergyAsia, December 12, Friday) — Conergy Asia-Pacific, the Singapore-based subsidiary of Germany’s renewable energy firm Conergy AG, said it has been awarded a contract to build a 2MW solar power plant for Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST). Conergy Asia-Pacific will work on the project as a consortium partner with National...
(EnergyAsia, December 12, Friday) — IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, said it has agreed to provide loans to the Energy Development Corporation, a leading geothermal producer, for its renewable energy initiatives including geothermal energy efficiency in the Philippines and the region. IFC’s15-year loan of 4.1 billion Philippine pesos (US$1=50 peso) will enable...
(EnergyAsia, December 12, Friday) — The Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE) has called for the government to establish a national institute to look into all issues related to the biofuels industry. In a special report on biofuels, ASTE’s President and the country’s former chief scientist, Robin Batterham, said the institute would bring...
(EnergyAsia, December 12, Friday) — Noble Group, a Singapore-listed global supply chain manager of agricultural, industrial and energy products, said it is committed to tackle the issue of climate change. At the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) Asia Meeting in Hong Kong last week, Noble announced plans to become a “carbon neutral” company by undertaking a...
(EnergyAsia, December 12, Friday) — Renewable energy sources will account for 67% of the electricity produced in developing countries in Asia by 2050, supplanting the need for nuclear energy and reducing requirements for fossil fuel-fired power plants, said a joint report by the European Renewable Energy Council (EREC) and Greenpeace International. The report, ‘Energy [R]evolution:...
(EnergyAsia, December 12, Friday) — The Asian Development Bank (ADB) said it has received financing commitments of over $100 million for a new post-2012 carbon fund. The bank will start work on the fund in January, and is seeking participation from private businesses to complement its founding public sector partners. The ADB-administered Future Carbon Fund...
(EnergyAsia, December 11, Thursday) — The global credit squeeze will likely cause world trade to shrink next year for the first time since 1982, said the World Bank. In its Global Economic Prospects 2009 report, the bank said that the sharp slowdown in economic growth has caused commodity prices to plummet, ending a historic five-year...
(EnergyAsia, December 11, Thursday) — Talisman Vietnam 46/02 Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Canada’s Talisman Energy Inc, said it has started oil production from the Song Doc field in Block 46/02 off the coast of Vietnam. Gross production from five pre-drilled wells is expected to reach approximately 25,000 bbls/d by early 2009, with another...
(EnergyAsia, December 11, Thursday) — Singapore’s KS Energy Services Limited said it will be deploying its new lift boat, KS Titan 2, to work on an offshore wind power project in the North Sea with Germany’s Siemens Wind Power A/S. The boat will replace KS Titan 1, which was previously scheduled for this project. The...
(EnergyAsia, December 11, Thursday) — Finland’s Wärtsilä said it has introduced a new upgrade kit for slow steaming for low-speed engines to enable shipowners and operators to save on fuel costs while slow steaming their ships. The kit allows Wärtsilä low-speed marine engines to be operated continuously at any power in the range of 20%...
(EnergyAsia, December 11, Thursday) — Philippine power producer First Gen Corp said its third quarter profit plunged 64% to US$35.6 million from the same period last year. The company cited higher interest and financing costs due to increased debt after its acquisition of a controlling stake in Energy Development Corp (EDC). In addition, First Gen...
(EnergyAsia, December 11, Thursday) — Japan’s electronics giant Sharp said it plans to mass produce its high-efficiency crystalline Si solar cells in 2010. The company claims the cells offer an energy conversion efficiency of 20%. The production technology for a prototype is already in place at a pilot plant. Industry analysts expect competition in the...
(EnergyAsia, December 11, Thursday) — Japan’s Itochu Corp said it has acquired a stake in Greenvision ambiente Photo-Solar, an Italian producer of solar power systems. Itochu paid more than 15 billion yen for a 43% stake. (US$1=93 yen). Greenvision has a strong sales organisation in Italy through which Itochu hopes to sells its products. Itochu...
(EnergyAsia, December 11, Thursday) — US IT giant Intel Corp said its subsidiary, Intel Capital, is investing $20 million in China’s Trony Solar Holdings Co. One of China’s largest equipment suppliers for the solar energy sector, Shenzen-based Trony plans to use the cash injection to improve its production and research and development. The investment adds...
(EnergyAsia, December 11, Thursday) — Australia’s Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has announced a A$6.2 billion plan to make the automotive industry more economically and environmentally sustainable by 2020. (US$1=A$1.55). The ‘Green Car Plan’ will feature an expanded A$1.3 billion green car innovation fund which will provide Australian car companies with the opportunity to receive government...
renewable sources by 2050, experts are projecting in a new study. The study by Greenpeace and the European Renewable Energy Council also forecast that the renewable power generation and energy efficiency industry was on track too soon exceed the role played by fossil fuels. The study predicts the world’s renewable energy industry would soon be...
a 510 megawatt (MW) hydro electricity project at Dikchu in India’s Himalayan state of Sikkim. Most of the victims were labourers employed by India’s National Hydro Power Corporation (NHPC), according to information released by Sikkim’s Labour Department. Notwithstanding the deaths, the state government and NHPC plan on developing more hydro-power projects in Sikkim. Human rights...