PetroChina Poised for $6bn Listing

June 21, 2007By Andy RowellBlog Post

China’s oil giant, PetroChina is planning to raise $6 billion in a listing of new shares in Shanghai, to finance oil exploration and overseas acquisitions. The company has also recently announced a couple of significant discoveries. Last month PetroChina, which invested $19 billion in 2006, announced a big discovery in Bohai Bay, an oilfield with … Read More

Oil Baron: Vast New Oil Areas Needed

June 12, 2007By Andy RowellBlog Post

The head of US oil giant ConocoPhillips has said that “vast new areas” will have to be opened up to meet a projected 40 per cent growth in demand for oil in just over two decades. Chairman and chief executive James Mulva said: ‘By 2030 we would have to bring on line 105 million barrels … Read More

The Scramble for Libyan Oil

March 7, 2007By Andy RowellBlog Post

After 20 years of isolation, Libya has become the new “destination of choice” for oil companies trying to find new reserves. “It’s a race for our black gold,” president of the National Oil Company Shukri Ghanem said. “We are organising it like the Olympic Games and may the best one win.” With each subsequent round … Read More

Outrage As Shell Gets Green Light to Drill in Beaufort Sea

February 22, 2007By Andy RowellBlog Post

The U.S. Minerals Management Service (MMS) has approved Shell’s plan to drill as many as a dozen exploration wells over the next two years in the Beaufort Sea. The agency, which supervises Alaska’s oil and gas leasing released an environmental assessment that said that the project would not cause “undue or serious harm or damage … Read More

Stop Pombo’s Final Act of Folly for Big Oil

November 13, 2006By Andy RowellBlog Post

The New York Times today takes issue with President Bush’s call to pass “bipartisan energy legislation” before this Congress finishes – saying that instead the “House and Senate should limit their work in this final session to as few measures as possible”. The energy bill Bush has in mind, says the Times, is in fact … Read More

Investment by Oil Industry “Inadequate” Says IEA

November 9, 2006By Andy RowellBlog Post

Further analysis of the IEA’s World Economic Outlook reveals that oil industry has barely increased its investment in oil and natural-gas production during the past five years after accounting for inflation.Data compiled by the IEA and reported in the Wall Street Journal, show that investment in the oil-and-gas industry was $340 billion in 2005, up … Read More

The Race Is On To Grab World’s Last Oil Hotspots

July 7, 2006By Andy RowellBlog Post

The Guardian reports today that “money [is] no object as the big players grab what is left of a diminishing resource”, quoting the recent decision by Sinopec of China to pay $1bn for the right to explore for oil in deep water off Angola. This has “shocked” the west, “which fears it could be left … Read More