Honeywell, Siemens, Others Sued Over Robotics Patents

By Megan Leonhardt

Law360, New York (November 16, 2011, 5:07 PM ET) — A Washington state-based software provider on Tuesday targeted Honeywell International Inc., Siemens Corp., oil refinery operator Motiva Enterprises LLC and others in three separate patent infringement suits over integrated software used to control robotic manufacturing machines.

“Defendants’ continuing acts of infringement are irreparably harming and causing damage to Roy-G-Biv,” one of the complaints said. …

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Wednesday, November 16, 2011

By KEVIN KOENINGER

MANHATTAN (CN) – Three Nigerian widows say Shell Petroleum and its African subsidiaries conspired with each other and with Nigeria’s military government “to violate basic human rights … so as to ensure their continued enjoyment of disproportionately huge profit from very cheap oil they obtained from the Ogoniland,” a 400-square-mile section of the Niger Delta.

The widows say their husbands, members of the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP), were part of “the Ogoni 9,” who were falsely accused of murdering tribal elders.

“Although none of the Ogoni 9 was near the town where the murder of the four tribal elders took place, they were convicted and sentenced to death in a trial that was widely condemned locally and internationally and resulted in the suspension of Nigeria from the Commonwealth of Nations. The Ogoni 9 were denied appeal process and were hurriedly executed by hanging eight days after the decision in spite of national and international pleas,” the complaint states.

“The lawyers for the plaintiffs and the other Ogoni 9 were harassed, threatened and denied access to their clients and as a result most of them withdrew their representation in protest and their clients had to face the rigged tribunal themselves.”

That Shell Petroleum Development Co. of Nigeria Ltd. (SPDC) “had a firm hold and control of the Nigerian government is undisputable as defendant Royal Dutch/Shell with and through defendant SPDC produces about half the oil and gas that constitute about 80 percent of Nigerian government’s annual revenue,” the complaint states.

“It is equally clear that defendants recklessly and heartlessly exploited this relationship with the Nigerian government to amass enormous annual profits at the expense of the Nigerians and the Ogoni people in particular.”

Shell began drilling in the Niger Delta in 1958, and since then “it had acquired land for oil drilling unfairly, dubiously and fraudulently from indigenes and built pipelines across the farmland and through the yards and in front of the homes of indigenes thereby … exposing the indigenes to heightened daily danger,” according to the complaint.

“Hydrocarbon pollution found in water in Ogoniland is reported to be more than sixty times of that allowed in the U.S. and a[t] 360 times the limit in the European community.”

The complaint adds: “The conspiracy that exist[s] among defendants and between defendants and the Nigerian government make it possible for defendant SPDC to hijack for the exploration and extraction of oil and gas, very scarce land from the indigenes of Ogoni communities and pay the indigenes sums that are far below value of the land.

“The defendants in step with the Nigerian government orchestrates a repressive and hopeless atmosphere in the Ogoniland and makes the prospect of meaningful living and subsistence in the Ogoniland impossible and as a result undermined the value of all that is of the Ogonis and their otherwise scarce and very valuable real estate.”

Since MOSOP was organized in the early 1990′s, Shell has used the mobile police, “the paramilitary branch of the Nigerian police … commonly referred to as ‘kill and go’ for their reputation of killing innocent people and walking away” to quell protests, the widows say.

The Ogoni people suffered repeated attacks in 1993, including one “against Ogoni villages near the Andoni border by armed troops who usually operated in boats belonging to Shell and Chevron … [in which] over one thousand (1,000) villagers were killed and twenty thousand (25,000) [sic] rendered homeless,” according to the complaint.

It adds: “As SPDC intensified its attacks with the help of Nigerian Security Forces against Ogoni communities, SPDC coordinated [a] media campaign by Royal Dutch/Shell that denigrates and attempts to discredit MOSOP leaders by blaming MOSOP and its leaders for the heinous crimes committed in Ogoniland.”

The vilification of the plaintiffs included pinning the killing of four Ogoni tribal elders on them in May 1994, leading to their arrest, torture and “obtaining false testimonies by bribing at least two witnesses to implicate MOSOP leadership … and having the Nigerian Military Government falsely charging the MOSOP leaders for murder,” the complaint states.

After their husbands were executed, the widows say, “two or more of the witnesses that testified at the trial against the MOSOP leaders later admitted in the presence of Shell’s attorney that Shell and the Nigerian Military junta bribed them to give false testimonies with promises of money and jobs at Shell.”

The widows say the attack on the elders was actually carried out by Lt. Col. Paul Okutimo, who was seen days before the murder “receiving seven large bags of money … that … were so heavy that one of them fell, broke open and [spilled] bundles of money … all over the ground.”

The plaintiffs, suing as individuals and as administrators of their husbands’ estates, seek compensatory and punitive damages for RICO violations, human rights violations, emotional distress, conspiracy, assault, torture and wrongful death.

The widows – Victoria Bera, Blessing Nkem Nordu Eawo and Vureka Charity Paul Levula – are represented by Francis Kadiri and Alaba Rufai.

SOURCE ARTICLE

FINANCIAL TIMES

November 16, 2011

By Daniel Dombey in Istanbul and Michael Kavanagh in London

Turkey said it hopes to conclude an exploration deal with Royal Dutch Shell in the coming days…

FULL FT ARTICLE

Printed below are several recent articles from Nigerian publications containing allegations of corruption relating to the Shell Malabu 9 billion barrel oil block deal.

* Appraisal to be completed by end-2013

* Kidan is rich in sour gas

KHOBAR, Saudi Arabia, Nov 16 (Reuters) – A joint venture between Royal Dutch Shell and Saudi Aramco has won approval from the Saudi government to study the possible development of Kidan area, in Saudi Arabia’s Empty Quarter, the South Rub al-Khali Co (SRAK) venture said on Wednesday.

Kidan is rich in sour gas and is near the 750,000 barrels per day (bpd) Shaybah oilfield, one of the biggest in the world’s top oil exporter. Sour gas has high levels of potentially deadly hydrogen sulphide and therefore is tougher to produce than conventional gas reserves.

Officials from Shell and the joint venture have said further studies are needed to understand the economics of the field before deciding whether it can be developed.

SRAK will drill up to three appraisal wells and conduct extensive studies and aims to complete its appraisal by end-2013.

It submitted its plan last year to continue exploration in Kidan, an area already discovered by Aramco years ago, after announcing in 2009 gas had flowed from Kidan.

“The delineation is very likely to prove significant volumes of additional gas reserves,” said Sadad al-Husseini, an oil analyst and former top official at the Saudi oil giant Aramco.

“The kingdom and the Gulf has important sour gas reserves and these studies will facilitate the development of other similar accumulations,” he said.

SRAK said it completed drilling the first of three exploration wells it plans to drill as part of a second phase of gas exploration.

One factor that could improve the economics of the Kidan exploration area is its proximity to Shaybah, where infrastructure for both oil and associated gas is in place, Michel Faure, the Chief Executive of Shell Saudi Arabia told Reuters in an interview.

Saudi Arabia, which has kept its vast oil reserves off-limits to foreigners, needs gas to help cover domestic fuel demand and conserve oil for lucrative export markets. It invited investors in 2003-2004 to find and produce gas in the desert in Saudi Arabia’s southeast, known as Rub Al Khali.

So far the four consortia have failed to find the volume of gas needed to fuel Saudi economic growth or guarantee returns for investors.

The former CEO of SRAK Kamal al-Yahya told Reuters in October 2010 he saw a potential for Kidan field and the surrounding area “to provide a significant future gas resources for the kingdom.”

SOURCE ARTICLE

(Reuters) – Energy and financial companies caught up in a scheme involving fraudulent renewable energy credits could now face civil fines from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

The EPA has issued 24 notices of violation to more than a dozen companies, including units of Royal Dutch Shell, Exxon Mobil and Morgan Stanley, for the use of invalid renewable identification numbers, or RINs, according to the EPA website.

To encourage renewable fuel output, the government requires U.S. oil companies to produce a certain amount of renewable fuel, or to purchase the RIN credits from producers of renewable fuels.

The companies were cited by EPA for using fake credits purchased from Clean Green Fuel LLC. That company’s owner, Rodney Hailey, has been charged with carrying out a $9 million scam involving the distribution of 32 million invalid credits.

Under the Clean Air Act, the EPA can assess fines of up $37,500 a day per violation for companies using the invalid credits, in addition to the economic benefits or savings that resulted from the violations.

The EPA said in a statement that it was in discussions on how to move forward with each company that was issued a notice of violation and with industry officials on the issues raised by invalid renewable energy credits.

“Enforcement of the renewable fuel requirements helps protect the program’s integrity and maintain a level playing field for regulated companies,” the agency said.

Shell said it is working with the agency to resolve this matter.

“When these RINS were purchased, they were believed to be valid,” Shell spokeswoman Jill Davis said in a statement.

Exxon Mobil referred comments about the notices to industry trade groups, the American Petroleum Institute and the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association.

API and NPRA sent a letter to EPA earlier this month expressing concerns about fraudulent renewable energy credits.

“Obligated parties that purchase invalid or fraudulent RINs have little means of discovering the problem, and are potentially faced with penalties for non-compliance with (Renewable Fuel Standard) requirements if the RINs are later deemed to be invalid,” the groups said.

Morgan Stanley declined to comment on the notices.

For a full list of companies that received notices, please see: link.reuters.com/kur94s

SOURCE ARTICLE

By ANDREW E. KRAMER

Published: November 15, 2011

BAGHDAD — Iraq’s cabinet approved a multibillion-dollar contract on Tuesday for Royal Dutch Shell, the Anglo-Dutch energy giant, to collect the vast amount of natural gas emitted, and currently burned off, as oil is pumped to the surface at three major oil fields in the south.

The project, which will eventually greatly reduce Iraq’s greenhouse gas emissions, is intended to bring modern methods of managing oil fields to an industry frozen in time by sanctions and the war. In addition, it strengthens Shell’s foothold at a time when international petroleum companies are vying for advantage in one of the few regions of the world where easily accessible, on-land fields are opening to new investment.

But it also strikes a political nerve. Some members of the Iraqi Parliament protested the deal as overly generous to Shell and its Japanese partner, Mitsubishi, though the investment — $17 billion over 25 years to build pipes and filters to collect the gas — will be funneled through a newly created joint venture owned 51 percent by an Iraqi state company, the South Gas Company.

Ali al-Dabbagh, a government’s spokesman, said that Shell and Mitsubishi’s project involved the fields at Rumaila, West Qurna, and Zubair, which are operated by consortiums led by BP, Exxon, Lukoil of Russia and Eni of Italy. Some 700 million cubic feet of “associate gas” is burned off, or flared, annually at the three fields.

The Shell project is one of several creating shared infrastructure in the south for companies that won technical service contracts in 2009, among the first awarded for Iraq’s oil fields since the fall of the government of Saddam Hussein in 2003. For instance, ExxonMobil is building a plant to process water for injecting into the fields, something all the companies will need to pump more oil.

Shell said it would sell the gas to electrical utilities in Iraq, but that it may also eventually export some.

“Capturing this gas will create a reliable supply of energy for Iraq while at the same time reducing greenhouse gas emissions,” Shell’s chief executive, Peter Voser, said in a statement. “This also sends a positive signal about the investment climate in the country.”

Iraq’s energy politics mostly swirl around oil. But as its riches of natural gas have come into focus, so too have disputes over dividing them. Some analysts noted that the new project focused on the associate gas that is abundant in the southern oil fields, in areas that are mostly Shiite, while untapped gas fields in the predominantly Sunni western desert remain unexplored.

In another recent agreement, over the weekend, officials in the semi-autonomous Kurdish region in the north confirmed Exxon had signed a contract to explore for oil there.

SOURCE ARTICLE

By Nayla Razzouk – Nov 15, 2011 12:16 PM GMT

Iraq’s cabinet approved a $17 billion contract with Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSA) and Mitsubishi Corp. (8058) for the capture of natural gas at three oil fields in the south of the country, a government spokesman said.

“The government has a 51 percent stake in the partnership, and the companies 49 percent, including 44 percent for Shell and the rest for Mitsubishi,” Ali Al-Dabbagh said today by telephone from Baghdad. “The agreement is for 25 years.”

Shell, Europe’s largest oil company, has been in talks with the government since 2008 to set up the venture to gather gas that is currently flared off and wasted. Iraq holds the fifth- biggest natural-gas reserves in the Middle East and is struggling to restore capacity for power generation after years of conflict and economic sanctions. Associated gas, once captured, would help feed power stations and overcome electricity shortages.

Iraq has signed 15 licenses for the development of energy resources, including three for gas, since 2008, five years after the U.S.-led invasion of the nation.

To contact the reporter on this story: Nayla Razzouk in Amman at nrazzouk2@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Shaji Mathew at shajimathew@bloomberg.net

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EXTRACTS FROM THE RepRisk WATER SCARCITY REPORT

RepRisk is the leading provider of dynamic business intelligence on environmental social and governance risks.

In 2010, access to clean water received recognition as a basic human right through a majority vote of the United Nations General Assembly. According to the UN, nearly 900 million people have no access to clean drinkable water, almost 1.8 billion live in areas where water is scarce, and a further 1.6 billion live in countries, which lack the infrastructure to extract water from natural sources. The World Bank calculates that by 2030, water demand will exceed supply by 40 percent, as a growing world population demands more water for agricultural, industrial and personal use.