April 19th, 2008:

redOrbit: Sakhalin-2 to Begin Year-Round Oil Production in June

Posted on: Friday, 18 April 2008, 21:00 CDT

MOSCOW. April 18 (Interfax) – Sakhalin Energy, the operator of the Sakhalin-2 project, plans to begin year-round oil production in June, a source at the company told Interfax.

Oil from the northern portion of the project territory will begin arriving once the Molikpak platform is connected to the new overland pipeline system. The pipeline is scheduled for completion in June.

The pipeline will move oil from the platform to the terminal at the southern end of Sakhalin Island being built on Aniva Bay, which is ice-free virtually year-round. read more

Further comments and information arising from the article we published yesterday, 18 April, revealing a chip and pin card fraud at a Shell garage in Portsmouth Road, Woolston, Southamption. By co-incidence or otherwise, within hours of publication, the garage was raided by the Police.

Chip and pin card fraud at Shell UK petrol stations

TWO COMMENTS POSTED ON TO THE ABOVE ARTICLE

April 18th, 2008 13:29

Dear Mr Donovan

I made a card purchase on 18th March 2008 at Portsmouth Road, Shell garage, woolston, southampton, and this is the only transaction I have made from this account. read more

Shell’s oil and gas terminal on Bonny Island in southern Nigeria’s Niger Delta

AFP: Shell sees ‘small’ oil production cut in Nigeria after attack

Saturday 19 April 2008

LAGOS (AFP) — Anglo-Dutch oil group Shell said Saturday it had slightly reduced oil production following a militant attack on a major supply pipeline in southern Nigeria.

“We discovered there was a major leak on the Greater Port Harcourt swamp pipeline. The leak appears to have been caused by explosives. We have isolated the line preparatory to repairs,” Shell spokesman in Lagos Tony Okonedo told AFP. read more

June is the final deadline for Total and Shell.

PressTV Iran: Total, Shell may miss Iran deadline

Sat, 19 Apr 2008 11:55:43 

Royal Dutch Shell and Total say they may miss the June deadline set by Iran to agree on developing the country’s South Pars gas-field.

Shell says there are possibilities the energy group’s technical studies for developing the phase 13 of the giant South Pars gas-field will not be completed by June.

“There is a lot of work to respond to the challenging contracting market and to make sure that we have structured the design in the right way,” Malcolm Brinded, Shell’s head of exploration and production, said. read more

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Crude Oil Touches $117

By GREGORY MEYER
April 19, 2008; Page B4

Crude-oil futures touched $117 a barrel and ended at their fourth record in five sessions Friday after a flurry of buying instigated by supply worries.

Light, sweet crude for May delivery gained $1.83, or 1.6%, to settle at $116.69 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange and rose as high as $117 a barrel after floor trading closed.
 
Oil markets were rattled by a pipeline leak in Nigeria, a major exporter of a high-quality crude blend similar to that delivered against the Nymex benchmark. A spokesman for Royal Dutch Shell PLC, part of a joint venture that operates the line, said the damage appeared to have been caused by explosives, and a “small quantity” of production was shut down for repairs. read more

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: UBS Opens Discussions With Dissident Investor

By KATHARINA BART
April 19, 2008

UBS AG has bowed to shareholder pressure and has begun talking with an activist investor calling for significant changes at the Swiss bank.

UBS on Friday said board members Serge Marchionne and Peter Voser met with Olivant Advisers Ltd., a London-based investment firm with a 1.1% stake in the Zurich-based bank. Olivant is led by former UBS Chief Executive Luqman Arnold.
 
Mr. Arnold said, “We had an open and constructive discussion and they gave their commitment that they are taking all of our views into consideration as they prepare for the annual general meeting.” read more

Financial Times: Transformation time for the LNG industry

By Carola Hoyos, Chief Energy Correspondent
Published: April 19 2008 03:00 | Last updated: April 19 2008 03:00

When BG Group began to build a billion-dollar liquefied natural gas plant in Trinidad and Tobago in 1996, one of the big draws was the Caribbean islands’ proximity to the US, the world’s biggest natural gas consumer.

But a little more than a decade later, many of BG’s ships are heading half way around the world to Japan, rather than the company’s regasification terminal in Lake Charles, Texas. read more