October 4th, 2007:

Front page / Business
10/04/2007 17:29 Source: AP ©          

Eivind Reiten, the chairman of oil company StatoilHydro ASA will resign due to an investigation of possible corruption over contracts in Libya. 
 
“Out of consideration to StatoilHydro, I have after careful consideration decided that it is right for me to stand down from my position as chairman of the board of StatoilHydro,” Reiten said.

The new company was created by state-controlled Statoil’s takeover of the oil and gas division of smaller Norwegian rival Norsk Hydro, and is 62.5 percent Norwegian government-owned. The companies earlier said it will be the world’s largest offshore oil and natural gas producer, surpassing Royal Dutch Shell PLC. read more

Lionel Laurent, 10.04.07, 1:25 PM ET
 
LONDON – The stakes are high for investing in Iran, and Turkey has found out the hard way: it has failed to get financing from overseas for a $3.5 billion gas deal with the Islamic Republic, a development which points to further problems for the likes of Shell and Total.

The Turkish Energy Ministry was quoted as saying Wednesday that state-owned energy company TPAO is going it alone, once an agreement is finalized later this month, to develop several phases of the South Pars gas field in Iran for $3.5 billion. read more

From: “Katia M. Peltekian”
Date: Thu, 04 Oct 2007 13:54:26 +0500 (AMST) IRAN: ENERGY PROFILE

EnerPub, TX –
Oct 3 2007

Iran, one of OPEC’s founding members, holds the world’s third-largest proven oil reserves, and the world’s second-largest natural gas reserves.

Iran is a member of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), and ranks amongst the world’s top three holders of proven oil and natural gas reserves.

Iran is OPEC’s second-largest exporter after Saudi Arabia, and is the fourth-largest exporter of crude oil globally after Saudi Arabia, Russia, and Norway. read more

Thu Oct 4, 2007 12:19 PM ET
By Ikuko Kao – Analysis

LONDON (Reuters) – An expected wave of expansions at United States refineries could reduce demand for fuel imports from Europe, which supplies a tenth of U.S. gasoline, traders and analysts say.

The new investments are likely to be triggered by Royal Dutch Shell’s decision last month to expand its Port Arthur plant in Texas, a project the company described as equivalent to building a new refinery, the first to be built in the United States for 30 years. read more

AMSTERDAM (Thomson Financial) – Royal Dutch Shell’s SNC Moerdijk chemicals unit in the Netherlands is being prosecuted for alleged violations of environmental regulations, SNC Moerdijk confirmed on a Shell website.

The first violation is related to a March, 2004 incident involving an ethylene oxide gas leak.

The prosecution is alleging that Shell was too slow to inform authorities that over 100 kilograms of ethylene oxide had escaped into the air.

Shell said on its website that it had first assumed the leak was less than 100 kilograms and that it is only required, under agreement with regional authorities, to directly report leaks in excess of 100 kilograms. read more

Thu Oct 4, 2007 6:15 PM BST
(Adds quotes from public prosecutor)

AMSTERDAM, Oct 4 (Reuters) – Dutch authorities are prosecuting Royal Dutch Shell (RDSa.L: Quote, Profile , Research) for not notifying authorities swiftly when one of its Dutch plants released a cloud of ethylene oxide into the atmosphere in March 2004.

A Shell spokesman said the firm initially thought the emission was less than 100 kg of the substance — the threshold for informing authorities — but an investigation later showed between 1,000 and 2,000 kg had been released. read more

No Mr Slick: The quiet man of big oil, van der Veer says prices need not be so high

Thursday 4 October 2007
The City Interview by Sam Fleming

RUNNING Royal Dutch Shell’s £130bn energy empire is in some ways like being in charge of a small country. Yet chief executive Jeroen van der Veer comes across more like a provincial postmaster than a swaggering oil supremo.
 
The 59-year-old-Dutchman is slightly gawky, with hesitant English and a penchant for long-distance ice skating. Lord Browne, his former counterpart at BP was known for his lavish lifestyle and expensive artistic tastes, but van der Veer is much more low key.
 
Over a plate of fish at the Daily Mail offices, he reveals he particularly likes visiting London’s National Gallery because it doesn’t charge an admission fee.
 
Despite his £2.5m-plus annual earnings, you won’t find van der Veer splashing out on Rembrandts for the living room wall. ‘The Dutch are like the Scots’ in their parsimony, van der Veer admits. ‘I don’t make a lot of purchases.‘
 
Beneath van der Veer’s unassuming exterior lurks one of the industry’s most dogged survivors.
 
The Shell career man emerged the unlikely victor of a bloody boardroom battle in 2004 after an accounting scandal. The revelation that Shell had been overstating its oil reserves cost van der Veer’s predecessor Phil Watts his job and sparked a welter of shareholder lawsuits.
 
Since then the Anglo/Dutch firm has been cleaning up its act by sharpening up accounting practices and scrapping its cumbersome dual board and dual stock market listing.
 
‘There is no point endlessly defending what happened in the past – we have to make very clear what is the future agenda of the company,’ van der Veer says.
 
Even in the depths of the reserves scandal, he adds: ‘I felt basically this was a strong company, if you look at the balance sheet and if you look at the portfolio of technologies we have.’
 
While across the Thames rival BP has lurched from crisis to crisis over the past two years, culminating in this year’s resignation of Lord Browne, Shell’s earnings have beaten analysts’ expectations for six straight quarters.
 
Its shares have risen 16pc over the past six months, while BP’s have been flat. That’s not to say the Shell supertanker doesn’t hit choppy waters. The big question hanging over the firm is where it will it find its oil in the future.
 
State-owned giants such as Gazprom or Saudi Aramco enjoy a stranglehold on the world’s remaining oil reserves and easily accessible crude is drying up.
 
That means Shell, Exxon, BP and their rivals face a future of scrabbling around at the margins – a sorry story compared with the glory days when the ‘Seven Sisters’ dominated world oil production.
 
The days of ‘easy oil’, or readily accessible reserves in places like the North Sea, are coming to an end, van der Veer admits.
 
His hope is that Shell will prosper by establishing technological supremacy over its rivals. An engineer by training, he started at Shell in 1971 following his military service and has eagerly upgraded the status of scientists and researchers in the company ranks since taking the helm.
 
He said: ‘If you look at the future, it is all about technology because the stuff (oil) is there, but it is either very deep in the ground or in difficult regions, or the Arctic. To unlock that you need technology.’
 
Talk of research and development is of little interest to Shell’s customers, who pay through the nose at the pump. read more

By Sarah Thompson

Oct. 4 (Bloomberg) — European stock-index futures declined as investors speculated that central bankers in the region will leave interest rates unchanged.

BHP Billiton Ltd. and Rio Tinto Group retreated in Australia after metals prices dropped. Royal Dutch Shell Plc may follow oil prices lower. Stora Enso Oyj and UPM-Kymmene Oyj will probably fall after Deutsche Bank AG downgraded papermaker stocks as it cut earnings estimates.

“Investors are nervous ahead of the interest-rate decisions today,” said Oliver Stevens, head of dealing at IG Markets Ltd. in Melbourne. “We’ve had a good run and any hawkish comments will alarm. Mining stocks are likely to take their cue from losses in Australia.” read more

Oct. 4, 2007 (China Knowledge) – Commerce Minister Bo Xilai forecast foreign companies, which own clean-coal technology and work with Chinese partners in coal sector, will gain great profits with small capital as China has been making continuous efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emission and ease its increasing thirst for oil.

Bo said China is focusing on the sustainable development of coal and energy. It is quite important to reduce emission in developing coal industry because coal is one the most import energy source. In the recent six years, China’s export of coal has accumulated to 510 million tons. China encourages foreign companies with advanced technologies to tap on China’s coal reserve. read more

By Jesse Westbrook

Oct. 3 (Bloomberg) — The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission will review whether energy companies give investors sufficient information about their oil and gas reserves after some firms overstated estimates.

The SEC named John Lee, a Texas A&M University professor, as its first academic engineering fellow, the agency said in a statement today. He will scrutinize energy reserves and recommend whether the SEC should revise its disclosure rules.

“I look forward to working with John Lee as we begin a review and evaluation of our current disclosure requirements,” John White, who heads the SEC’s corporation finance division, said in the statement. read more

By Upstream staff

Anglo-Dutch supermajor Shell topped the bidding in today’s sale of federal oil and gas leases in the central Gulf of Mexico, offering $90.5 million for Walker Ridge Block 7, the Interior Department’s Minerals Management Service (MMS) said.

Shell also topped the stakes in the value of high bids submitted, with $554.6 million offered on 69 bids, followed by US supermajor Chevron with $283.4 million bid on 44 tracts. Gulf players Marathon Oil, Cobalt Energy and Murphy Oil were also in the top five bidders by value. read more

By Sheila McNulty in Houston
Published: October 4 2007 03:00 | Last updated: October 4 2007 03:00

Big oil and gas production projects are likely to suffer delays with the industry expected to face up to a 15 per cent shortage of qualified engineers by 2010.

The shortfall in the industry is already taking hold with insufficient engineers to meet 2007 exploration and production project demand, according to Pritesh Patel of consultants Cambridge En-ergy Research Associates and co-author of a report into the skills shortage. read more

By Andrew England
Published: October 4 2007 03:00 | Last updated: October 4 2007 03:00

Rising drilling and riggings costs, combined with shortages of skilled personnel and equipment, are affecting hydrocarbon projects throughout the Middle East, with some being delayed and other contracts being renegotiated.

Producers in the region, from Libya to Saudi Arabia, have embarked on ambitious plans to increase production and capacity to meet growing global demand and take advantage of record oil prices. But many will struggle to meet their schedules, experts say, and can expect to pay exorbitant prices if they are to ensure they have the material and personnel in a market suffering severe constraints. read more

By Ed Crooks
Published: October 4 2007 03:00 | Last updated: October 4 2007 03:00

JPMorgan Cazenove, a company broker to BP, has cut its forecast of the oil group’s third-quarter profits, suggesting that the consensus of analysts’ estimates is about 30 per cent too high.

In a note, Fred Lucas of Cazenove said the broker was cutting its forecast of third-quarter net income by 9 per cent to $3.915bn. It predicted earnings per share of 10.1p for the quarter, compared with a consensus forecast of 13.2p. read more

Softer Refining Margins
Are Hurting Oil Firms
As Crude Surge Persists
By BETH HEINSOHN
October 4, 2007; Page A12

ConocoPhillips’s third-quarter update offered the latest sign that the business of refining and selling gasoline and other fuels has become much less profitable.

The company, based in Houston, said refining margins narrowed significantly during the just-ended quarter compared with the second quarter. Refining margins, or the difference between the price of oil and the price of refined products, are an indicator of refining-industry profit margins. read more

More and more oil executives maintain that there are just a few years left before production reaches its peak, and that we are sleepwalking into economic catastrophe. David Strahan reports on dwindling global reserves

Wednesday October 3, 2007

The Irish chapter of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil (Aspo) could hardly have wished for better. Last week, on the first day of Aspo’s recent conference in Cork, the oil price obliged by striking a new all-time high. And in the following days it struck three more in a row. read more