(EnergyAsia, December 22 2011, Thursday) — Iran’s oil revenues have risen sharply in 2011 and will reach an all-time high of more than $100 billion for the year, according to estimates by US consultant IHS Cambridge Energy Research Associates (IHS CERA). At nearly a third higher than 2010, the revenue increase has been the result...
(EnergyAsia, December 21 2011, Wednesday) — Amid major celebrations of a breakthrough oil deal and its 20th anniversary of independence from Soviet rule on December 16, Kazakhstan was suddenly faced with the biggest outbreak of deadly anti-government violence in recent memory. As many as 50 people, including several retrenched oil workers, were reported killed during...
(EnergyAsia, December 20 2011, Tuesday) — Uzbekistan has proved natural gas reserves of three trillion cubic metres and probable reserves including the Caspian Sea shelf of 5.9 trillion cubic metres. Its main markets are Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Russia and China, exporting nearly a quarter of its annual production of more than 60 billion cubic metres...
(EnergyAsia, December 20 2011, Tuesday) — China could triple its domestic production of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to 7.5 million tonnes a year by 2015, according to the China Petroleum and Chemical Industry Federation. The industry group said China now has more than 20 LNG production plants in operation and is building at least another...
(EnergyAsia, December 20 2011, Tuesday) — Russia is stepping up its opposition to plans to develop pipelines to export oil and gas from Central Asia to Europe. While China has made significant progress in expanding pipeline access to oil and gas reserves in Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, Russia appears more worried about the numerous proposed...
(EnergyAsia, December 19 2011, Monday) — Sinopec Kantons Holding Ltd is aiming to become a major oil storage terminal owner and operator in Asia with its proposed acquisitions of stakes in five joint ventures from its parent China Petroleum & Chemical Corp (Sinopec). The Hong Kong Stock Exchange-listed company has announced that it will fund...
(EnergyAsia, December 16 2011, Friday) — US ratings agency Fitch said it expects merger-and-acquisition (M&A) activities to remain strong in Asia’s oil and gas sector in the coming year. In a new report, “2012 Outlook: Asia Oil & Gas”, Fitch Ratings said it is keeping its ‘stable’ rating on the sector even though sustained high...
(EnergyAsia, December 16 2011, Friday) — The annual average price of global crude benchmark Brent for 2011 is expected to be the highest in both real and nominal terms in the 151-year history of the industry, said US consultant HIS CERA. It expects Brent to average about $111 for the year at the end of...
(EnergyAsia, December 16 2011, Friday) — US-based energy and natural resources company PHI Group Inc said it has signed a memorandum of understanding with Sao Nam Group, a Vietnamese company engaged in energy, mining, real estate, and infrastructure, to build a coal-fired power plant in Hai Lang District in Vietnam’s southeast Quang Tri Economic Zone....
(EnergyAsia, December 15 2011, Thursday) — Japanese companies have agreed to import around 70% of the liquefied natural gas (LNG) output from the Ichthys project off Australia’s Northern Territory state for 15 years from 2017. Upstream company Inpex Corp said its 74.8%-owned Ichthys LNG Pty Ltd will supply a total of four million tonnes of...
(EnergyAsia, December 14 2011, Wednesday) — US energy media group Platts said Saudi Arabia produced just 9.7 million b/d of crude oil last month, well below the 10 million b/d figure claimed by Oil Minister Ali Al Naimi at a conference in Riyadh early this month. In a speech delivered on his behalf by a...
(EnergyAsia, December 14 2011, Wednesday) — The global food system needs to reduce its dependence on fossil fuels to succeed in feeding a growing world population, said the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). “There is justifiable concern that the current dependence of the food sector on fossil fuels may limit the sector’s ability to...
(EnergyAsia, December 14 2011, Wednesday) — US Peabody Energy said it has acquired a 5.1% equity interest in Hong Kong-listed Winsway Coking Coal Holdings Ltd for an undisclosed sum. Deutsche Bank brokered the acquisition which was made over a series of purchases, said Peabody. The two companies, which operate a joint venture in Mongolia that holds...
(EnergyAsia, December 13 2011, Tuesday) — China Petrochemical Corp (Sinopec), Asia’s biggest oil refiner, has agreed to raise its 15% holdings in a US$20 billion liquefied natural gas (LNG) project in Queensland state to 25%. Sinopec Group, which paid US$1.5 billion for its initial 15% stake in the Australia Pacific LNG Pty Ltd project in...
(EnergyAsia, December 13 2011, Tuesday) — The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) raised its crude oil output by 550,000 b/d to 30.6 million b/d in November from 30.05 million b/d in October, said energy media group Platts. But the McGraw-Hill subsidiary disputed Saudi Arabia’s claims that it was producing more than 10 million...
(EnergyAsia, December 12 2011, Monday) — Russia’s grip on Central Asia’s economies along with its bargaining position in protracted talks with China over piped oil and gas sales are likely to have been weakened by Turkmenistan’s expanded long-term natural gas sales to China. Already an important market for Central Asia’s natural gas export since 2009,...
(EnergyAsia, December 12 2011, Monday) — Russia will focus on developing liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports in the coming year as it shifts its natural gas export policy towards Asia away from pipelines. According to the London-based Centre for Global Energy Studies (CGES), Japan’s rising gas demand following Fukushima, Turkmenistan’s success at expanding piped gas...
(EnergyAsia, December 12 2011, Monday) — Pipeline politics have become a unique and central feature of post-Soviet politics as Central Asia gas producing countries struggle to break free of Russian control while seeking to avoid being dominated by Western Europe and China. Since the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia, which controls extensive...
(EnergyAsia, December 9 2011, Friday) — Declaring an end to the era of cheap oil, Brazil’s leading oilman said “the new normal will be a very tight oil market.” José Sergio Gabrielli de Azevedo, CEO of Brazil’s state-owned Petrobras, made this call at the fifth annual Platts Global Energy Outlook Forum entitled, “The World’s Quest...
(EnergyAsia, December 7 2011, Wednesday) — India’s refining industry is sending out mixed signals about the state of its health, boasting plans to substantially expand capacity this decade while at the same time warning that mounting financial osses threaten its viability. Oil Minister S. Jaipal Reddy last month announced that India will expand its oil...
(EnergyAsia, December 6 2011, Tuesday) — India will boost its oil refining capacity by more than 22% to 238 million tonnes over the next two years with the start-up of new refineries and expansion of existing ones, said Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas R. P. N. Singh. State-owned Indian Oil Corp (IOC),...
(EnergyAsia, December 6 2011, Tuesday) — If the world is counting on natural gas supply from shale and other unconventional sources to meet its growing demand for energy, it must move quickly and decisively to overcome the threats, complaints and fears brought on by the hydraulic fracturing or ‘fracking’ method of production. Predictions for a...
(EnergyAsia, December 5 2011, Monday) — China is hoping to ease the country’s worsening power shortages by allowing electricity prices to rise from December 1, its first increase in six months, while capping the rise in cost of thermal coal to less than 5% from next year. The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the...
(EnergyAsia, December 5 2011, Monday) — With its large growing stake in southern Iraq, Shell has suspended negotiations with officials in Kurdistan to avoid incurring the wrath of the Baghdad government which has threatened sanctions against ExxonMobil for dealing with the troubled semi-autonomous region. A partner with ExxonMobil to develop the 8.7-billion barrel West Qurna...
(EnergyAsia, December 2 2011, Friday) — The joint developers of the Columboola Project in the Surat Basin of Australia’s Queensland state said they have more than doubled its inferred coal reserves by 757 million tonnes to 1.297 billion tonnes. In a joint statement, Australia’s MetroCoal Limited and China’s SinoCoal Resources Pty Ltd, said drilling results...