provinces of Alberta and British Columbia could help the world cope with tightening oil and gas supplies, said the International Energy Agency (IEA). IEA chief economist Fatih Birol wants Canada to continue expanding oil sands production in Alberta and to start drilling for oil and gas off the coast of British Columbia. But he also...

to quickly become a major energy supply, thanks to recent finds of large natural gas deposits. The province has large untapped oil and gas reserves that could play a critical role in meeting the energy need of North America. EnCana, a major Canadian energy firm, is most bullish about prospects in British Columbia which already...

costs as new government rules could require them to spend up to US$13 per barrel to bury carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions released during the extraction process. It now costs oil sands producers around US$60 per barrel for normal extraction work.   Oil majors like Shell and Exxon will try to pass on the higher costs...

obtained record revenues last month from companies bidding to buy the rights to explore for oil and gas in their provinces. British Columbia generated just over C$520 million in its second biggest sales ever while Saskatchewan made over C$240 million, also its second-largest ever sale in the monthly land auction. (US$1 = C$1.05). For the...

Corp or Sinopec said first-half profit fell 77% to 8.26 billion yuan. (US$1=6.8 yuan). The government refused to let the company and other oil retailers raise fuel prices, forcing them to absorb the higher feedstock cost. Asia’s biggest oil refiner said sales rose 31% to 722.4 billion yuan. It said the refining business incurred “significant...

selling or delay supplying fuels to parts of the country if they are not reimbursed for selling oil products to domestic consumers at below market prices. Fearing a backlash from the public, the government has refused to let Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL) and Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) raise retail...

up to $9 billion on a new joint venture oil refinery in Nansha in China’s southern Guangdong province, said KPC’s CEO Saad al-Shuwaib. In an interview with a Chinese newspaper, he said the proposed 300,000-b/d plant will cost nearly twice as much as initial estimates of $5 billion. The partners had received preliminary government approval...

production in non-OPEC countries could reach their maximum by 2010, said the International Energy Agency. Fatih Birol, the IEA’s chief economist, who has been stepping up his warnings about the world’s tightening oil supplies, said key regions such as the North Sea and the Gulf of Mexico are experiencing rapid production declines. Output from the...

(EnergyAsia, August 25, Monday) — A group of 20 UK lawmakers and two non-government organisations (NGOs) have published a report to warn of peak oil’s threats to the world economy, political stability and food security. Chaired by Liberal Democrat lawmaker John Hemming, the All Party Parliamentary Group on Peak Oil, and development groups RESET and...

(EnergyAsia, August 25, Monday) — Singapore-listed marine fuels supplier Chemoil has said it has acquired a controlling interest in a storage terminal in the Philippines for US$13 million. The ocean-front terminal in Batangas has an operational capacity of 34,000 cubic meters to store gasoline, diesel and fuel oil. Chemoil, one of the world’s leading integrated...

(EnergyAsia, August 25, Monday) — ‘Australian Coal Summit’ will be held at the Intercontinental Hotel in Sydney, Australia from September 2 to 4. The event is a national executive forum for Australia’s coal mining industry uniting coal executives with policy makers, national and international consumers, traders, analysts, infrastructure service providers and shippers. The summit will...

(EnergyAsia, August 25, Monday) — Japan’s Mitsui Chemicals said rising construction cost may force it to delay building a new phenol plant on Singapore’s Jurong Island worth “a few hundred million dollars”.   The company, which has invested more than S$1 billion in Singapore over the past 42 year, said this year’s 30% rise in...

(EnergyAsia, August 25, Monday) – Caltex Australia Ltd, the country’s only listed downstream oil company, said lower refining margins contributed to a 33% decline in its first-half profit to A$196 million. (US$1=A$1.14). The company said it will pay an interim dividend of A$0.36 per share. Managing director Des King said the company had benefited from...

(EnergyAsia, August 25, Monday) — An advanced electricity network using distributed energy resources – local, low emission and renewable power – is the vision of a national, collaborative research cluster for Australia’s future energy supply.   The Intelligent Grid Cluster, launched in Sydney last week by Kim Carr, Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research,...

(EnergyAsia, August 25, Monday) — US-based Welwind Energy International Corp has provided an update on two of its wind power projects.   It said that last month’s heavy flooding sweeping through most parts of southern China have caused a delay in Welwind’s project in Zhanjiang province. Meetings scheduled with provincial officials had to be postponed...

(EnergyAsia, Aug 25, Monday) — The Indian government has proposed to build a 2.5-million-metric-tonne underground crude oil storage facility in Padoor-Heroor village in Karnataka state’s Udupi district. The government has established Indian Strategic Petroleum Reserve Limited as the agency to build and manage the country’s first underground oil storage. The Rs12.5 billion facility will serve...

(EnergyAsia, August 25, Monday) — The Middle East will continue to experience strong oil demand growth this year, said the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). Buoyed by strong economic growth, the region’s oil demand is expected to rise by at least 290,000 b/d this quarter. It grew by 330,000 b/d to around 6.8 million...

(EnergyAsia, August 22, Friday) — Vietnamese agencies are building a 6,000-tonne natural gas storage facility in Go Dau industrial park in the southern province of Dong Nai at a cost of 215 billion billion. (US$13 million). They will also build a pipeline system and a port that will handle tankers of at least 50,000 tonnes....

(EnergyAsia, August 22, Friday) — PTT Plc, Thailand’s largest state energy firm, said its second quarter net profit rose 13.8% to a record 29.9 billion baht on account of higher gas sales and refinery profits. (US$1=33 baht). Thailand’s biggest listed company at around $21 billion monopolises the country’s gas pipeline business. First-half net profit was...

(EnergyAsia, August 22, Friday) — Netherlands’ Scheuten said it has established a strategic alliance with Taiwanese disc manufacturer Ritek. Scheuten said its solar knowledge combined with Ritek’s optical media and OLED expertise will enable them to take the solar energy to the next level. Ritek will start with the production of 30MW of silicon modules...

(EnergyAsia, August 22, Friday)— Taiwan’s Formosa Petrochemical Corp plans to more than double its refrigerated LPG storage capacity to 180,000 tonnes to support its petrochemicals production. The privately-held firm has started work on building two new 50,000-tonne tanks in Mai Liao city in northwestern Yunlin county by 2010. The company now has two 40,000-tonne tanks...

(EnergyAsia, August 22, Friday) — Advanced Holdings Ltd, a Singapore-based supplier of proprietary process equipment and technologies, clean energy solutions and environmental technologies, said its net profit jumped by almost a third to S$5.4 million for the first half of 2008 compared with the same period last year. (US$1=S$1.4). Advanced said its revenue grew 60%...

(EnergyAsia, August 22, Friday) — International air passenger growth slowed while cargo traffic fell for June, said the International Air Transport Association (IATA). IATA said cargo contracted by 0.8% compared to June 2007 while passenger demand growth fell to 3.8%, the lowest level since 2003. Passenger load factors dropped to 77.6%, 1.2 percentage points below...

(EnergyAsia, August 22, Friday) — The Indonesian government had cancelled the licences of up to 21 domestic and foreign companies who had proposed to set up oil refineries between 1994 and 2000. State agency Capital Investment Board (BKPM) said the companies had failed to meet the terms of their investment licences after promising to invest...

(EnergyAsia, August 22, Friday) — LDK Solar, a manufacturer of solar wafers, said it has signed a five-year contract to supply multicrystalline solar wafers to India-based XL Telecom & Energy Limited. LDK Solar will deliver approximately 300 MW of multicrystalline silicon solar wafers to XL Telecom & Energy Limited over a five-year period, starting in...