Archive for 'Oil and gas'

Royal Dutch Shell PLC has scrapped plans for a long-delayed oil sands mine, becoming the latest company to pull the plug on a major Alberta expansion as crude prices hover near multiyear lows. The global oil giant said on Monday it is withdrawing an application with federal regulators to build its Pierre River mine north of Fort McMurray, Alta., effectively killing a 200,000 barrel-a-day project that had been dormant for years. The decision underscores challenges faced by even ...

The Obama administration floated a plan Tuesday that for the first time would open up a broad swath of the Atlantic Coast to drilling, even as it moved to restrict drilling in environmentally-sensitive areas off Alaska. The proposal envisions auctioning areas located more than 50 miles off Virginia, North and South Carolina, and Georgia to oil companies come 2021, long after President Barack Obama leaves office. For decades, oil companies have been barred from drilling in the Atlantic Ocean, ...

Israel’s antitrust authority said Monday it may revoke an arrangement permitting an Israeli and a U.S. company to develop Israel’s largest natural gas field by branding them a cartel. The authority summoned representatives of Israel’s Delek Group and Texas-based Noble Energy and told them it was « still considering to announce that buying Leviathan was illegal. « We didn’t make any decision today, » an authority spokesman said after the meeting had ended. Anti-trust authorities have been targeting the companies, ...

At $65/barrel, most North America shale plays are still profitable with the current rig and well economics on an individual or series basis, according to an industry expert with A.T. Kearney. The firm doesn

Halliburton and Baker Hughes have announced a definitive agreement to merge in a deal worth US$34.6 billion. The highly contentious deal saw some rather personal language used in very public terms between the bosses of the two oilfield service majors in the run-up to this announcement. The deal will see Halliburton, currently the second biggest oilfield service company in the world after Schlumberger, acquire all the outstanding shares of Baker Hughes in a stock and cash transaction. ...

Eni has made an important gas finding in the Merakes exploration prospect, in the East Sepinggan Block, where Eni is operator with a 100 per cent stake. The block is located in the offshore East Kalimantan (Borneo), 170 km south of the Bontang LNG Plant and 35 km from the offshore Jangkrik field, also operated by the Italian oil major. The finding was made through the Merakes 1 well which was drilled at a water depth of 1,372m ...

Christophe de Margerie, the charismatic and outspoken chief executive of the French oil company Total, was killed when his private jet hit a snow plough as it was taking off from Moscow’s Vnukovo airport on Monday night. His death leaves a void at the top of one of the world’s biggest listed oil firms at a difficult time for the industry as oil prices fall and state-backed competitors keep them out of some of the best oil exploration territory. ...

Statoil exited Azerbaijan’s Shah Deniz gas project on Monday, selling a 15.5-percent stake to Malaysia’s Petronas for $2.25 billion as part of asset sales to shore up returns to shareholders. Like other oil majors, Norway’s Statoil has been selling assets amid rising costs and falling oil prices. It earlier sold a 10 percent stake in Shah Deniz. French oil major Total sold out of Shah Deniz in May saying it would focus on operating projects rather than holding ...