Drilling & production

COOEC has awarded Technip a pipeline installation contract for the Liwan 3-1 shallow water project, located in the Pearl River Mouth Basin, China Sea, 300 km South of Hong Kong, China.

Production at Nexen’s Buzzard field is to remain halted until at least Wednesday as an investigation continues at the North Sea platform.

Sources have revealed that Iran has had to deploy more than half of its tanker fleet to store surplus oil supplies offshore.

Various reports have revealed that a well based in the Russian Arctic suffered a major leak for 37 hours before being plugged.

Shell has announced that it has agreed to buy Cove Energy for US$ 1.8 billion in order to access a portion of Eastern Africa’s vast gas reserves. Despite the bid, hopes of a bidding war remain.

Spanish company Repsol has announced that it would consider taking legal action against investors in YPF in retaliation for the Argentinian government’s controversial expropriation of the company.

Reports reveal that Iran has had to shut down one of its oil terminals in the wake of a cyber attack upon the internal computer systems at the national oil ministry.

Egypt has terminated it’s gas supply contract with Israel, EMG has called the attempt unlawful and is seeking arbitration.

Total has begun production at the Greater Bongkot South field in the Gulf of Thailand, gas will be exported directly into PTT’s gas grid and the condensate will be taken off by an FSO at the Greater Bongkot North field.

The exploration company, Borders & Southern has announced a “significant” gas condensate discovery off the Southern coast of the Falklands.

In a bid to boost production, Brazil’s state-run giant Petrobras has laid out plans to invest US$ 500 million in Argentinian projects.

April 2012: Yesterday I spoke at a business conference in Phoenix about the “High Cost of Mixed Messages” sent by management teams. Included in my presentation was a story about “Dave”, the control room operator; the names were changed to protect the innocent…

Thiess has won the contract to perform the groundwork for the downstream section of the Wheatstone LNG project.

Despite holding steady for the moment, Brent crude prices look set to suffer their steepest drop in over three months as global economic news disappoints.

The latest EIC Monitor quarterly report tracking new project announcements shows that the global energy industry has seen encouraging signs of growth in the first quarter of 2012.