Saudi Arabia and Russia’s desire to open the spigots to cool the surging price of oil is heading for a World Cup style gang tackle from Iran, Venezuela and Iraq at the OPEC meeting in Vienna on Friday. According to Bloomberg, quoting Iran OPEC representative Hossein Kazempour Ardebili, any agreement to raise or cut output agreement requires unanimity from the Vienna meeting and any attempt at increased production will meet with resistance. Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak has suggested a desired output of 1.
Industry
Geoscience study sees below the salt to solve exploration challenges in Southwest Africa
Surmounting the significant challenges of mapping deep structures below salt with seismic data alone, a new non-seismic study which includes the Gabon to Angola margin, encourages further interest in the largely under-explored Southwest Africa offshore region. The newly-released Southwest Africa Margin SEEBASE® multi-client Study and GIS from Frogtech Geoscience focuses on syn-rift basement evolution highlighting the pre-salt petroleum plays that constitute the main target following the recently discovered giant field accumulation in the South Atlantic-conjugate margin of the Santos basin in Brazil.
Oil and gas industry’s $27 billion boost to Australian business
The Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association has welcomed the release of data that highlights nation-wide benefits flowing from Australia’s oil and gas industry. This follows an APPEA member survey reflecting widespread economic benefits from the sector. “The economic footprint of the oil and gas industry goes far beyond its production wells and eight liquefied natural gas (LNG) plants. Oil and gas is not ‘just’ a resources industry – the industry supports a vast supply chain of businesses in manufacturing, services and construction, said APPEA Chief Executive Dr Malcolm Roberts.
Safehouse Habitats acquires ESPRAT group of companies
Perth-based Safehouse Habitats and its UK-based parent, Starn Group, have successfully completed the acquisition of the ESPRAT group of companies based in Australia and Malaysia. Safehouse said this latest expansion would extend the existing Starn footprint in these territories and strengthens its position in the region by providing a platform to further develop the Malaysian market for Safehouse habitats, and to provide the gas detection and related services of another Starn business, Sabre Safety Services.
Osaka Gas signs Taiwan LNG receiving terminal deals
OSAKA, Japan - Osaka Gas Engineering Co., Ltd. (OGE), a subsidiary of Osaka Gas Co., Ltd. (Osaka Gas) has entered into an agreement to provide consulting services for the construction of LNG receiving terminals on behalf of CPC Corporation, Taiwan (CPC) and Taiwan Power Co., Ltd. (TPC) respectively.
East coast gas prices could rise 30 percent in five years
Wood Mackenzie forecasts Australia's East Coast gas prices to rise up to 30 percent to between A$10 and A$13 /per gigajoule by the mid-2020s. The company concluded from a recent study that it was no surprise gas prices in the East Coast have jumped up over the last three years, a situation driven primarily by declining cheap gas supply from the Cooper Basin and offshore Victoria. New gas supply sources are also proving far more expensive to develop than the cheap legacy supply sources that have maintained Australian gas supply for decades.
ADNOC announces US$45 Billion investment to become leading lobal Downstream Player
The Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) has unveiled plans to invest US$45 billion with partners over the next five years to become a leading global downstream player. The plans were unveiled at the ADNOC Downstream Investment Forum, which took place today in Abu Dhabi, UAE. The event brought together more than 40 CEOs and 800 senior business leaders from the global oil and gas, energy, petrochemical and finance industries, as well as many other sectors.
$46.3bn will be spent on Southeast Asia’s upstream capex by 2020
An average capital expenditure (capex) of $17.8bn per year will be spent on 336 oil and gas fields in Southeast Asia between 2018 and 2020, according to GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company. Capex on Southeast Asia’s traditional oil projects will add up to $8.3bn over the three-year period, while heavy oil fields will require $1.7bn over the same period. Investments into gas projects in Southeast Asia will total $43.4bn in upstream capex by 2020. Jonathan Markham, Oil & Gas Analyst at GlobalData said, “Shallow water projects will be responsible for over 63 percent of $46.
BP Commits to Sell Gas to Alaska LNG Project
The Alaska LNG Project has reached a "historic milestone" as BP Alaska and Alaska Gasline Development Corporation (AGDC) announced the parties have agreed to key terms of a Gas Sales Agreement, including price and volume. The terms are captured in a Gas Sales Precedent Agreement which was signed on May 4, 2018. In a statement Alaska Gas Development Corporation said both the parties anticipate finalizing a long-term gas sales agreement in 2018 for AGDC to purchase BP Alaska’s share of 30 trillion cubic feet (TCF) of gas from the Prudhoe Bay and Point Thomson units.
Blue Energy raises concerns over hydraulic stimulation
Blue Energy is concerned about that additional layers of regulation governing hydraulic stimulation could burden an already labouring oil and gas industry. Barely two weeks after the Northern Territory government lifted the moratorium on hydraulic fracturing in the north of Australia, Brisbane-based Blue Energy welcomed the development, but also noted some concerns in its quarterly activities report released last week.