Rich Cookson’s next blog from Sakhalin: “The Russian frigate Nadezhda, packed with acoustic monitoring equipment, has arrived off Piltun. After a five-day journey from Vladivostok on the 108m-long, three-mast ship, the marine mammal experts and acousticians on board have started their work.
Russian oil
Sakhalin Energy: “Our Critics Are Wrong”
Rich Cookson’s next dispatch from Sakhalin: The Deputy CEO of Sakhalin Energy, David J Greer, is bullish about his company’s impact on Sakhalin, dismissing many of his critics’ claims as “absolutely wrong”. “We bring joy and happiness to the people of Sakhalin,” he says. “And we are providing clean and efficient energy to an energy-starved … Read More
Sakhalin Energy: “We Have No Impact on Whales”
Here is Rich Cookson’s third blog from Sakhalin. “In early-morning off-the-record briefings, Sakhalin Energy’s (SE) employees – many of them from Shell – insist that the company is committed to protecting the island’s environment. They say, for instance, that the company has new scientific data which proves that its offshore activities have had no discernable … Read More
Sakhalin – “No Guarantees” About Engangered Whales
Here is Rich Cookson’s second blog from Sakhalin Island, off Russia’s east coast. Rich writes: “The Sakhalin Energy (SE) project, Sakhalin II, is the second of nine planned extraction projects around Sakhalin. Exxon holds a 30 per cent stake in Sakhalin I, an oil development on the northeastern Sakhalin Shelf. Affiliates of the Russian oil … Read More
Reporting Live from Sakhalin: Big Oil’s New Frontier
Over the next few days, Oil Change will be bringing you an exclusive blog by Rich Cookson, a British journalist who is visiting the oil and gas developments at Sakhalin Island off Russia’s east coast (see map). Rich writes: “In the sea off Sakhalin Island in the far east of Russia, the giant legs of … Read More
BP Buys $1bn Stake in Rosneft
BP has astonished many analysts and critics by saying it is going to buy a $1bn stake in the state-owned Russian oil producer, Rosneft. It will seen as a major boost to President Putin just days before the G8 Summit. However opponents of the flotation told the Independent newspaper that BP had “a gun to … Read More
G8 Summit Heating Up as Police Snatch Up Rights Activists
In the run-up to the G8 Summit in Saint Petersburg this weekend, civil society and opposition figures are holding a two-day conference in Moscow to draw attention to President Vladimir Putin’s authoritarian tendencies. They want the other seven G8 countries to put pressure on Russia to spend more time promoting civil rights. The police have … Read More
The Flawed Billion Dollar Flotation of Russia’s Oil Company
The Independent leads on how “this week the London Stock Exchange will play host to one of the biggest share sales on record. But the £6bn flotation of Rosneft, a state-owned Russian oil producer, will not only be huge, it will also be massively controversial”. The paper goes on to argue that critics of Rosneft, … Read More
China Buys Billion-Barrel Russian Field from TNK-BP
The dragon is thirsty. China’s consumption of oil has risen exponentially in the past decade and by last year it was the largest oil importer after the US. Slowly but surely China is buying up foreign oil and gas reserves to fuel its rapidly growing economy. In little under a year, Chinese firms have signed … Read More