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Some 19 companies – including BP, Chevron, Shell, StatoilHydro, and Total – have expressed interest in bidding for the Carabobo projects that could collectively produce more than 800,000 bpd, and require investments of up to $30bn.
Click to continue reading “Caesar Chávez drives campaign of oil seizures”
Similarly, Shell will invest in a billion-dollar pipeline in Venezuela if it expects a billion-dollar payoff down the road. For Shell, this requires a leap of faith–a pipeline can’t be taken apart and reassembled in Texas or Alaska if things don’t work out under Chavez. It’s in Venezuela for good, unlike a truck that can be driven across the border to deliver packages in Colombia or Peru instead. Once the expense has been incurred, or the investment has been made, what’s to stop Chavez from sending in troops to nationalize Shell’s assets, or jacking up the royalty fees that Shell pays to the government?
You’d think BP or Royal Dutch Shell, for instance, would be especially hesitant about cozying up to the strongman again. After all, BP saw one of its executives flee Russia to escape trumped up charges while having a power-sharing agreement forced on it. Shell was forced to sell its Sakhalin Island interests to Russian gas giant Gazprom. Such are the dangers of signing over your soul to the devil.
Click to continue reading “Big Oil Can’t Resist the Chavez Charm”
…faced with the plunge in oil prices and a decline in domestic production, senior officials here have quietly begun soliciting some of the largest Western oil companies in recent weeks, including Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell and Total, in the hope of getting them to invest in Venezuela again.
Click to continue reading “EMBARGO – Quietly, Chávez opens the door to Western oil firms”
It says the cuts will be made from joint ventures between Venezuela’s state oil company and foreign companies including Royal Dutch Shell, Chevron Corp. and France’s Total
Click to continue reading “Venezuela reduces oil production”
Venezuela, a founding member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, will cut output at joint ventures with Chevron Corp., BP Plc and Royal Dutch Shell Plc to help restrain oil supply and bolster prices.
Click to continue reading “Venezuela to Cut Chevron, BP, Shell Output for OPEC”
Royal Dutch Shell has announced that it will delay some of its planned expansion of expensive oil sands projects in Canada. Rob J. Routs, executive director of oil products and chemicals and a member of the board at Royal Dutch Shell, said that reaching the target of 700,000 barrels a day would be “pushed out at least two to four years.”
Click to continue reading “OPEC Plans Drastic Cut In Oil Production”
Oil is, after all, a primary source of man-made global warming, while spillages and drilling have sometimes inflicted lethal environmental damage. Despite the sharp falls of recent months, dramatic price rises have also underwritten every postwar global recession, including the current economic malaise.
Having failed twice in two months to calm plunging oil markets, OPEC ministers are set to weigh another round of steep production cuts as the world’s economic travails continue to drive crude prices to levels unseen in years.
Click to continue reading “OPEC to Discuss Another Round of Production Cuts”
As the price of a barrel falls to below $50 for the first time in years – to a third of its value just a few months ago – petrol will be cheaper but the shockwaves mean crisis for oil-producing nations and further instability for a battered global economy
Click to continue reading “From the Kremlin to Caracas, how oil collapse changes everything”
: Dear IMBer, or IBMer, or whatever - if you can explain to me the difference between the two quoted press release examples of geophysical applications in reasoned scientific terms, I shall be more than happy to admit to being a amateur geophysicist (not geologist). Perhaps it is you who is confused. Geophysics and Geology are not the same - close bed fellows, yes - but not the same. If so, then it is you who should get out your needles, wool and get on with "one plain, two purl" rather than embarking on such a commentary.
: Shellwaarbenjijnu has no clue what he/she is talking about. Probably some amateur geologist who wants to be important on the blog. Try to stick to your knitting!
: Paying over 7 mln $ to get rid of this monster of a woman shows how deeply Shell has sunk. She was a stealer of ideas. She was the ultimate token woman, a disgrace to her gender and it has put off many high quality women to pursue a career in Shell. Her disgusting behaviour of being the slave of Watts was evident to all. This latest scandal makes it clear she should never have been promoted to were she ended up. Another costly mistake of Shell. And the top echelon? They know no shame anymore and carry on with more spin stories as usual.
: Perhaps Voser will pull the same trick on Brinded as Watts did on v.d.Vijver. Watts announced that reserves would grow by 5% and that Walter would explain how.... The rest is history. I can only hope that history will repeat itself and Brinded finally gets fired for his gross underperformance and sustained bullshit. Perhaps I have said so before: never trust a man with facial hair.... I shall be watching the announcements how they will increase production with great interest.
: THE ARTICLE "Donovan email to Gavin White, Shell International Limited: 10 March 2010" has been updated with a self-explanatory email reply received on 11 March from Richard Wiseman, Chief Ethics & Compliance Officer, Royal Dutch Shell Plc.
: The Forbes article implies that by stopping sales of gasoline to Iran, Shell is complying with US sanctions. Shell's investments in the upstream sector in Iran are not mentioned, even though these are of far greater significance for both Shell and the Iranians.
: Amnesty International has been an informed and courageous critic of Human Rights abuses around the world for many decades and they are certainly not adverse to criticising governments in Nigeria, Burma, Zimbabwe and all around the world. The point about international companies like Shell is that they have a choice. They are not obliged to operate anywhere if they find that the local conditions are in conflict with their principles. Amnesty’s recent criticisms of Shell have certainly been strong and I am aware that in Shell there is a feeling that they have been unfair and to some extent uninformed. So a dialogue between Amnesty and Shell is very much to be welcomed. Amnesty is a highly respected organisation – indeed a former top executive of Shell, Sir Geoffrey Chandler, was a senior officer of Amnesty in his post Shell years.
: Same old, same old. Amnesty International and their human rights again go for the soft underbelly of the international companies rather than the real problem in Nigeia which is their corrupt Government. Good on Shell for attending and agrreing to being questioned. BUT, surprise, surprise nobody from the Nigerian Government (perhaps they didn't get enough of a bribe to appear or perhaps Amnesty knew they would get nowhere with them). Pollution in the Niger Delta remains a problem, albeit that conditions are slowly improving. Living conditions, infrastructure and most other normal day-to-day things should be the responsibility of the corrupt Government not international oil companies. These evil governments such as Nigeria, Zimbabwe and Burma need to be bought down by the UN so that their people might have a better chance of a reasonable life.
: Very polite correspondence between Wiseman and the Donovans. I estimate Wiseman's hourly internal tariff at around 500 U$ per hour (his salary plus support plus extensive overheads). Over the years Shell must have spent a fortune discussing the Donovans, putting the most expensive lawyers on the case, and developing policy how to battle them. It becomes Churchillian: 'we will fight them on the web, and in the courtrooms, and in their own offices and on the streets. But we wil NEVER surrender. With unlimited funds this maybe so, but it is wasting shareholders money and it solves nothing. I do not see the Donovans give up anytime soon. So perhaps a new paradigm needs to be developed? Any ordinary man or woman at the coalface would solve this problem within minutes and for less money than what is being burned now. But the Shell kings are no ordinary people, they live in cloud cuckoo land. I will keep following with great interest how all this develops, it is even better than the daily Dilbert!!!
: W.E. Pratt knew it already a hundred years ago when he said "Oil is found in the minds of men" But he was one of the founders of the Standard Oil company, whereas the people who try to make us believe that IBM can come to the rescue of Shell appear to be only good at getting rid of their most experienced minds.
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