Brazil gave the green light to oil major Royal Dutch Shell to buy smaller rival BG, advancing the $70 billion merger, the largest of the past decade, closer to completion in early 2016.
Shell is set to become the largest foreign operator offshore Brazil after it buys BG, so the clearance from the country was a crucial step to complete the merger on time.
Brazil's competition authority CADE said on Wednesday it had given preliminary approval to the transaction "without restrictions." BG said that if no appeals were lodged or referrals made in the next 15 days, CADE’s clearance would become final. A spokesman for Shell confirmed the approval and the 15-day appeals period.
France could get the equivalent of 10 years of gas consumption by exploiting the methane trapped in the former coal mines of its deprived eastern regions, a French company running a rare domestic exploration programme said on Wednesday.
France, which slammed the door on developing shale gas due to environmental concerns and blocked many exploration permits, has discretely supported efforts by Française de l'Energie, based in the Lorraine region, to exploit so-called coalbed methane.
"France is completely dependent on imports, so it's rather interested in seeing we can produce a gas which is clean and near existing infrastructure," said Julien Moulin, head of the company formerly known as European Gas.
Philippine conglomerate San Miguel Corp's energy subsidiary is borrowing $400 million from banks to finance the construction of a power plant north of the capital, IFR reported on Wednesday.
SMC Global Power Holdings Corp mandated DBS Bank, Mizuho Bank and Standard Chartered for a $400 million, seven-year loan for the construction of a 300-megawatt coal-fired power plant in Bataan province, said IFR, a Thomson Reuters publication.
Spain's antitrust watchdog CNMC said on Wednesday it had fined Repsol 22.6 million euros ($24.9 million), and another four franchised companies lesser amounts, for fixing petrol prices in service stations.
The head of Aberdeen-based Craig Group yesterday swatted away any suggestions the firm may be experiencing buyer’s remorse after its shipping division added a new vessel to its fleet.
A number of North Sea oil and gas companies have been forced to the wall this year after their ambitious spending plans failed to reap rewards as orders tailed off amid the oil price slump.
But Craig Group’s boss said its outlay on emergency response and recovery vessels would safeguard hundreds of jobs at the privately owned, family-run shipping and energy services company.
State-run Ghana Gas Company has shut down its Atuabo gas processing plant due to an unexpected disruption of gas supplies from the offshore Jubilee field operated by Tullow Oil, the plant's director said on Tuesday.
George Yankey told Reuters that Tullow had informed the plant of the disruption on its floating production vessel. Gas supplies were cut on July 3 and there was no indication when they would resume, he said.
Libya has lifted force majeure at the major Ras Lanuf oil terminal, though restarting exports would take at least two days depending on available crude, a spokesman for the National Oil Corporation said on Tuesday.
Restarting Ras Lanuf would be a major boost for Libya's crippled oil industry. The terminal, along with another major eastern oil port Es Sider, has been under force majeure since December last year due to fighting between rival factions,
Norway's oil and gas firm Statoil plans to take the final investment decision in September on building a floating wind farm off the coast of Scotland, set to be the first of its kind in the world, a spokesman for the company said on Tuesday.
Statoil, which has run a single floating offshore turbine for several years in Norway, is now planning to build five floating turbines, each with 6 megawatt capacity, off Aberdeen in an area where the water depth is around 100 metres.
With development areas for foundation-fixed offshore turbines limited to shallow seas with depths up to 50 metres, and with some countries experiencing strong opposition against the visual impact of turbines on the land, floating offshore is seen as the next major growth area for the wind industry.
Africa-focused Tullow Oil is turning to low-cost technology in its search for new oil reserves after the collapse in the price of crude and a poor run of discoveries forced the company to slash its exploration budget by 80 percent.
Energy companies worldwide, from wildcatters to international behemoths, cut spending in an effort to keep their books balanced after the near-halving of oil prices since last June as a result of sharp growth in global supplies.
British-based Tullow slashed its exploration budget for this year to $200 million from a target of $1 billion in 2014. Its reduced programme includes wells in Gabon, Kenya, the Netherlands, Suriname and Pakistan.
The Chinese government has given independent refinery Shandong Dongming Petrochemical Group approval to import 7.5 million tonnes of crude oil a year, or 150,000 barrels per day (bpd), the state economic planner said on Tuesday.
It is the first independent plant to win crude oil quotas since the introduction of new regulations allowing more private participation in a sector long dominated by state oil giants.
Egypt and Russia's top oil producer Rosneft have signed two initial deals for the supply of petroleum products and liquefied natural gas to Cairo, the two sides said on Tuesday.
The oil ministry said in a statement the deals include the supply of benzine and bitumen, as well as 24 LNG cargoes for state gas company EGAS over two years starting from the fourth quarter of 2015.
Chancellor urged to tackle "recession in confidence" as North Sea downturn affects tens of thousands in north east
Chancellor George Osborne was urged last night to use his first all-Tory Budget to tackle a “recession in confidence” in the North Sea sector which is hitting the north-east economy and tens of thousands of people who depend on the industry for a living.
Mr Osborne will deliver his Budget on Wednesday – and north-east businesses have called on him not to stand still after pledges made to the industry during the run-up to the general election.
They expect him to build on the £1.3billion oil and gas support package he introduced in March.
Dana Gas, one of the largest oil and gas investors in Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region, said on Sunday that it had obtained a favourable ruling from a London arbitration tribunal in its dispute with Kurdistan authorities.
The Abu Dhabi-listed firm, which leads a consortium of investors, had filed an arbitration case in London in October 2013 against the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), seeking to confirm its contract rights and to obtain payments for products which it had delivered.
Egypt has raised the prices it pays Eni and Edison for the natural gas they produce in the country, an official with state-owned gas company EGAS said on Sunday.
The agreements mark the latest move by Egyptian authorities to improve terms for foreign oil and gas businesses in the hope that more competitive pricing will encourage investment in the energy-hungry country.
A strong order book could not prevent Aberdeen-based procurement services firm Gas and Oil Technology (GOT) going bust, with 19 jobs lost amid the oil price downturn.
Work ground to a halt at GOT because the firm did not have enough stock to fulfil its orders, despite investing heavily in infrastructure in recent years, administrators from KPMG said yesterday.
Nineteen of GOT’s 23 employees have been let go with immediate effect, with the remaining four staying on temporarily to help wind down the company.
The benefits of solar power to business will be showcased today at Pitmedden Garden estate in Aberdeenshire while the UK swelters in the grip of heatwave.
The event is part of the industry’s annual “solar independence day” scheme that opens a selection of UK solar-powered homes and enterprises to the public.
The National Trust for Scotland (NTS) has installed a 115 panel array on the roof of the estate’s gardeners storage shed, which is generating power for the site’s museum of farming life and other buildings.
Exxon Mobil has ended its oil exploration in Madagascar after disappointing findings in its off-shore blocks, the Malagasy Mining and Petroleum Minister said on Friday.
The U.S. company had no immediate comment.
Exxon's affiliates resumed exploration in Madagascar in 2013 after a four-year pause due to a force majeure declared after the 2009 coup on the Indian Ocean island.
Brazil's government expects a bill ending state-run Petrobras' dominant role in key offshore oil areas to pass Congress, reversing one of President Dilma Rousseff's signature policies, a source told Reuters on Thursday.
The bill, which is before Brazil's Senate, is likely to pass and also win approval in the Chamber of Deputies, Brazil's lower house, said the source, who works at the Presidential Palace and has direct knowledge of government thinking.
"There's nothing the government can do," said the source, who asked for anonymity because permission to speak with the press had not been given. "It knows it can't stop this defeat."
Crescent Point Energy, Canada's No. 4 independent oil producer, said on Thursday it will acquire privately owned light oil producer Coral Hill Energy Ltd, operating in west central Alberta.
The deal comes just days after Crescent Point's plan to buy another Canadian light oil producer, Legacy Oil + Gas, was approved by Legacy shareholders.
"We are very pleased to have recently acquired Legacy Oil + Gas Inc and to acquire Coral Hill, as they both possess a large inventory of highly economic wells with significant waterflood upside," Scott Saxberg, chief executive of Crescent Point, said.
Activist investor Crystal Amber has been building its stake in a North Sea business it expects could be worth £17billion.
The Guernsey-based fund now owns 12% in Hurricane Energy which is closing in on a farm-in deal that could start to unlock 400million barrels of oil and “breath life” into the North Sea.
Hurricane was founded in 2005 by Dr Robert Trice, a specialist in an unusual hydrocarbon geology known as “fractured basement reservoirs”.
Ukraine expects to store enough natural gas for next winter despite cutting off imports from Russia and Russian flows crossing the country destined for Europe will not be disrupted, Energy Minister Volodymyr Demchyshyn said on Thursday.
State energy firm Naftogaz stopped buying gas from Russia's Gazprom on Wednesday after energy ministers from Kiev and Moscow failed to agree on quarterly prices.
"The suspension of deliveries will not affect the safety or transportation of gas (to Europe) ... or preparation for the new heating season," Demchyshyn said.
Norway's Statoil and Lithuania's Lietuvos Energija plan to join forces to develop a small-scale liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply operation, competing with Finnish gas utility Gasum.
Litgas, an LNG arm of state-owned Lietuvos Energija, and Statoil signed a preliminary agreement on Thursday to establish a joint venture by the end of 2015, Litgas said in a statement.
Statoil has a contract with Litgas to deliver 0.5 billion cubic meters of gas per year to Lithuania's LNG terminal at Klaipeda port in 2014.
A £20million programme of seismic surveys in the UK continental shelf will get under way within weeks, the energy industry’s regulator said today in Aberdeen.
The programme − announced in the last Budget − is aimed at stoking North Sea drilling, which is currently at an all-time low.
Gunther Newcombe, director of exploration and production at the Oil and Gas Authority, said the surveys would cover an expanse of 15,000 to 20,000 kilometres with data slated for release in the second quarter of 2016.
Refiners in South Korea, the world's fifth-largest crude oil importer, have stepped up spot purchases this year, buying at prices depressed by an oil glut as they run their plants at high rates to catch strong processing margins.
With the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and other producers keeping crude taps open in spite of soft global demand growth, tens of millions of unbought barrels have built up in floating storage sites and dragged down international oil markets.
Still, the profit earned on turning a barrel of Dubai crude into fuel have held at $7.50-$9 a barrel this year - well above annual averages since at least 1997 - as crude benchmarks dipped to multi-year lows, sparking consumer demand for gasoline and naphtha.
Oilfield services company Hunting said it expected a 50 percent to 75 percent fall in operating profit for the year as it continued to reel under a drop in global rig counts and a weak oil and gas market.
Hunting shares fell more than 7 percent on the London Stock Exchange on Thursday morning. The stock was the top loser on the FTSE-250 midcap index.
