August 13th, 2007:

From the Associated Press
August 13, 2007

CAIRO — The United States is on a concerted campaign to discourage foreign energy companies from doing business in Iran. But analysts say Iran’s investment woes are its own fault — it could dodge international pressure and attract more foreign money by simply offering better deals.

“They are doing the embargoing for us,” said Mikkal Herberg, a former oil executive now with the National Bureau for Asian Research, a think tank partially funded by the U.S. government. read more

Published: August 12, 2007

For a brief moment it seemed that Admiral Robert Peary and Dr. Frederick Cook had risen from the mists to renew their race to the North Pole.

On Aug. 2, a couple of Moscow legislators in a small submersible vessel deposited a Russian flag on the seabed two miles under the polar ice cap – backing up Russia’s claim to about half the floor of the Arctic Ocean. Canada’s foreign minister, Peter McKay, dismissed the move, sniffing that “this isn’t the 15th century.” But just in case, Prime Minister Stephen Harper set off on a three-day tour of the region and announced plans to build two new military bases to reinforce Canada’s territorial claims. read more

By Upstream staff

Foreign players who declared force majeure and quit Somalia 16 years ago when the country descended into civil war will be given the chance to resume their activities under the country’s proposed hydrocarbons law, it emerged today.

According to a parliamentary bill obtained by Reuters, companies that held concessions before 30 December 1990 would be given the right to return to those areas under new production sharing agreements.

The new production deals will set out different financial terms, exploration periods and obligations as well as new block sizes. read more

By Upstream staff

Malaysia and Brunei have reached a tentative deal to end a maritime border dispute that has halted exploration off Borneo for four years, sources in both countries said today.

A joint proposal to resolve the boundary issue is expected to be publicly endorsed by the leaders of both countries tomorrow, and could lead to the resumption of oil exploration in the area, sources told Reuters.

“It might resolve (the oil dispute),” a Malaysian source familiar with the proposal told the news agency. The source added that the proposal dealt with the sovereign boundary and that the next step would be to sort through the overlapping oil claims. read more

By: Dr. Elias Akleh
13 August 2007

Many military officials, political analysts, and strategy study groups anticipated the war against Iran to be launched at the beginning of 2007, sometime between mid January and late April, when weather conditions would be ideal for aerial sorties and naval invasion. The signs were apparent with the heavy naval traffic in the Arabian Gulf, and the number of the conducted war games on both sides. 

Yet, we are now in August and war did not start. Did the Bush administration cancel its war plans after all the aggressive war-mongering rhetoric and threats, and after spending millions of Dollars sending American nuclear aircraft carriers with their battle groups to the gulf? Did Cheney’s fiery threats and promises to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities lose their flames? Or maybe Israel and its AIPAC had stopped pressuring the Administration to hit Iran’s nuclear facilities observing the statement of Israeli Strategic Affairs Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, to the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee on 28th February 2007 that Israel can deal with Iranian nuclear threat alone if necessary. “We can face the country (Iran) even if we’re left to face them one-on-one”, he stated. read more

By Mimi Swartz  September 2007 Issue

When a London tabloid threatened to out Lord Browne, the BP C.E.O. was forced to step down. Now, as the global oil giant struggles with a change in management and a crush of wrongful-death lawsuits, shareholders are learning that his company may also have been leading a double life.

Unlike Americans, the British have never been too eager to elevate their corporate leaders to godlike status, and for quite some time, that was just fine with John Browne, most formally known as Baron Browne of Madingley. Just 59 years old when the trouble started, Browne was a slight, acutely polite man with an elfin grin who also happened to be one of the most powerful businesspeople on the planet. He had devoted 41 years to turning BP, a once fusty national institution, into the world’s second-largest oil company and its fourth-largest company, period. And though he enjoyed being known as the Sun King by his legions of admirers, Browne was content to live quietly, spending time at his homes in London, Cambridge, and Venice. “Before all this happened,” says Peter Wright, editor of the Mail on Sunday, a London paper, “if you’d asked the man on the street about Lord Browne, he wouldn’t have heard of him.” read more

14:11 | 13/ 08/ 2007 

MOSCOW, August 13 (RIA Novosti) – A senior environmental official, who presided over a series of high-profile probes, denied media reports Monday that he was in membership talks with a Kremlin-backed party and planned to run for parliament.

Vedomosti daily said Monday referring to a party source that Just Russia had proposed Oleg Mitvol, known for attacking Russian dignitaries over alleged construction violations and lucrative foreign-operated energy projects, join the party ranks ahead of parliamentary elections in December. read more

By John Donovan: 13 August 2007

PREFACE: The article below was supplied to the high command of the oil giant Royal Dutch Shell plc this morning including its Chief Executive, Jeroen van der Veer, its Chairman, Jorma Ollila and the Chief Executive of Shell Exploration & Production, Malcolm Brinded.

The invitation with the article contained the following sentence:

“You only have to ask for more time for consideration if you want to supply comment for unedited publication with the article or wish to point out in categorical terms any factual inaccuracy, in which event we would take the appropriate action”. read more

The Board of Directors has endorsed a restated Gazprom Investment Program and Budget (Financial Plan) for 2007.

In accordance with the endorsed updates in the Investment Program, total investments will amount to RUR 779.36 bln, RUR 249.98 up on the Investment Program approved in December 2006. At the same time, capital investments will account for RUR 335.5 bln (RUR 25.06 bln down on the Investment Program approved in December 2006), with long-term financial investments to make up RUR 443.86 bln (RUR 275.04 bln up on the Investment Program approved in December 2006). read more

2007-08-13
 
The major investments placed in company acquisitions this year has forced Russian gas giant Gazprom to considerably cut its planned investments in the development of the Shtokman field. The cuts leave it up to French partner Total to invest in the huge project.

In a meeting last Friday, Gazprom’s Board of Directors approved the final version of the company’s investment plan for 2007. According to the plan, Gazprom will cut its investments in the Shtokman field with 50 percent from the original 17 billion RUB to 8.6 billion RUB, newspaper Kommersant reports. read more

August 13, 2007

Sen. Claire McCaskill of Missouri introduced a bill last week that would give refiners and retailers five years to install temperature-measuring equipment at their pumps. The bill provides a subsidy to independent stations to purchase temperature-measuring nozzles. It also permits states to take separate, similar action.

“This Senate action and separate House hearings will also ignite discussion of wider oil industry practices,” the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights, an industry watchdog group, said in a statement. read more

NICHOLAS KÖHLER | Monday August 13, 2007

Late last month, five trade unions representing 2,500 Alberta construction workers won strike mandates from their members, an unprecedented event: Alberta’s construction unions have been regulated since 1982 by a labour code so complex — or so business-friendly, in the unions’ view — that securing a strike mandate is akin to solving a Rubik’s cube by committee. Because it is the first threat of job action in a generation, observers shrink from predicting what disruptions could take place in the oil sands, the sector most vulnerable to a strike. read more

12 August 2007

A WIDOW faces financial ruin as she can’t prove her sailor husband is dead – more than a year after he went overboard.

Merchant seaman Richard Yates, 49, died while working on a Shell gas tanker on a voyage from France to Africa.

But police in Bermuda – where the vessel was based – have not explained how he died or sent Beth, 49, of Stirlingshire, a death certificate.

She cannot claim his pension or get her mortgage paid off without it.

She said: “I am being denied the circumstances surrounding my husband’s death. Now I face the daily worry of finding money for the house, loan and car. read more

By John Bynorth
Solicitor’s call comes as Briton held to ransom

A LEADING adviser to the oil industry in Nigeria has demanded that British firms based in the country work more closely with the government and local communities to end the constant threat of kidnappings.

Solicitor Leon Moller, who provides legal and practical advice to workers and firms overseas, spoke out after British worker Dave Worth was snatched in the Niger Delta’s oil capital Port Harcourt on Friday – where four died yesterday after gun battles between rival gangs. read more

By Megumi Yamanaka

Aug. 13 (Bloomberg) — Shares of Showa Shell Sekiyu K.K., the Japanese unit of Royal Dutch Shell Plc, had their biggest gain in more than three years, after the company raised its profit forecast.

The shares climbed as much as 88 yen, or 6.9 percent, to 1,357 yen and traded at 1,340 yen at the 11 a.m. morning break on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. The today’s gain is the biggest since July 6, 2004, when the stock advanced as much as 9.2 percent.

The Tokyo-based refiner on Aug. 10 raised its full-year profit forecast to 39 billion yen ($330 million), an increase of more than 10 percent from 35 billion yen it had estimated in May. Showa Shell released its first-half earnings and estimates for 2007 after the market close on Friday. read more

By Joe Carroll

Aug. 12 (Bloomberg) — A venture owned by Exxon Mobil Corp. and Royal Dutch Shell Plc, the world’s largest oil companies, spilled 1,050 gallons of oil at a California well today, the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services said.

The oil spilled about 11:45 a.m. local time after a flow line leaked at a well in Fresno County operated by Aera Energy LLC, the state agency said on its Web site. Bakersfield-based Aera is owned by Exxon and Shell.

The spill has been contained and didn’t contaminate drinking water supplies or waterways in the area, the emergency services agency said. A phone message left at Aera’s corporate office wasn’t immediately returned. read more