Apache’s further oil discoveries in the North Sea are a real “morale boost” for the sector, according to the chief executive of Oil & Gas UK.
Deirdre Michie spoke to Energy Voice on the back of last month’s announcement of up to 70million barrels of recoverable oil in the North Sea.
US-based Apache Corporation announced finds on two exploration wells in the Beryl area and a “large” discovery at its Seagull prospect about 50 miles south of its huge Forties Field.
An ailing oil and gas industry has forced experts to lower their expectations for economic growth across the whole of Scotland during 2015.
Brian Ashcroft, emeritus professor of economics at Strathclyde University said yesterday the downturn offshore was stifling onshore service businesses throughout the country.
He was speaking after the university’s Fraser of Allander Institute – an economic think-tank – delivered its latest commentary on the state of Scotland’s finances.
The head of Oil and Gas UK (OGUK) yesterday urged companies to drop “cynicism” and embrace the new way of working after the trade body unveiled a number of new initiatives at an annual business event.
OGUK’s Share Fair aims to stoke collaboration and drum up business by giving supply chain companies a rare chance to have one-to-one interviews with operators’ decision makers throughout the day, in a format not dissimilar to speed-dating.
OGUK chief executive Deirdre Michie said that while the attendance was down slightly on previous years, a turnout of 900 plus was still very good and showed the industry is trying to improve the difficult situation it finds itself in.
Range Resources has signed an agreement to sell its Nora assets for $876million.
The properties encompass 3,500 operated wells and 460,000 net acres located in Virginia.
The company said the sale is scheduled to close by year-end and is subject to customary closing conditions and purchase price adjustments.
Norway should give companies fiscal incentives to continue production from maturing oilfields in the North Sea as investment falls, Exxon Mobil XOM.N Production Vice President John Chaplin said on Wednesday.
Unlike many other oil and gas producers, Norway, Western Europe's top oil producer, hands out licences for free and subsidises exploration and development costs, before imposing a 78 percent tax on production.
Libya’s oil output dropped below 400,000 barrels a day after the divided country’s internationally recognized government in the east closed a port run by a rival administration in the west, in a push to assert control over more energy assets and exports.
Production fell after crude exports halted at the port of Zueitina, Mohamed Elharari, a spokesman for the National Oil Corp.’s management in the western city of Tripoli, said Wednesday by phone. Libya pumped 430,000 barrels a day in October, data compiled by Bloomberg show.
Zueitina will be closed until further notice, and tankers seeking to load crude there must now register with a rival NOC management loyal to the internationally recognized government based in eastern Libya, according to a Petroleum Guard spokesman Ali al-Hasy. Vessels registered with the NOC administration in Tripoli, seat of an Islamist-backed government, are “illegitimate” and won’t be permitted to load at Zueitina, he said.
The Scottish Government should consider introducing tolls to help tackle a £2 billion road maintenance backlog, according to a new report.
The Institution of Civil Engineers Scotland said about a third of local roads are in an unacceptable condition in its latest review of the country’s infrastructure.
The declining state of local roads risks undermining improvements made by major investment in projects such as the Queensferry Crossing and Borders Railway, the report said.
The institution, which has 8,000 members in Scotland, said estimates put the cost of simply preventing further deterioration at £245.5 million a year.
Oil traded near $48 a barrel before US government data forecast to show crude stockpiles increased for a sixth week in the world’s biggest consumer.
Futures gained as much as 0.7 percent in New York after advancing 3.8 percent Tuesday. Inventories probably expanded by 2.5 million barrels in the US, keeping supplies more than 100 million barrels higher than the five-year seasonal average, a Bloomberg survey shows before an Energy Information Administration report Wednesday.
Crude may never rise to $100 a barrel again, according to Vitol Group, the world’s largest oil independent trader.
Kuwait’s oil minister said he believes oil prices have bottomed out, according to reports.
Ali al-Omair was asked if he agreed with recent remarks made by Qatar’s energy minister.
He said for between two and three months prices hadn’t gone done so potentially be “at the bottom”.
Maersk Line plans to reduce its headcount by an estimated 4,000 staff members in a bid to adapt to the changing market place.
The company said it was making the move on the back of a lower outlook for the global shipping market.
Maersk said it would help “simplify the organisation”.
Magnolia Petroleum has begun a 10 well drilling programme targeting the Woodford formation in the Central Oklahoma Oil Province play.
An estimated 3.2billion barrels of oil have already been recovered from 60 reservoirs.
Magnolia has a stake in each of the 10 wells which are operated by Continental Resources.
Petrofac has teamed up with Faroe Petroleum and Eni Hewett to establish a cost saving partnership across their UK operations in the Southern North Sea.
The tripartite agreement is aimed at driving efficiencies and commercial synergies.
Petrofac will share logistics across the Schooner, Hewett and Ketch gas fields to share logistics and accommodation services across the facilities.
In a record downturn for the oil industry, cash is everything to companies and dividends are everything to their investors. One tool is helping Europe’s three biggest producers preserve both, but there’s a long-term price to pay.
Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Total SA and BP Plc will retain $8 billion a year in cash by giving investors the option of receiving payouts in shares instead, according to Jean-Pierre Dmirdjian, an analyst at Liberum Capital Ltd. That’s equivalent to about 8.5 percent of total cash and equivalents currently on their books, making the so-called scrip dividend a vital tool as companies curb spending to ride out the slump in oil prices.
The Oil and Gas Authority (OGA) will struggle to revitalise exploration if the industry continues to haemorrhage jobs and skills, the RMT union warned yesterday.
RMT also said the new regulator – launched earlier this year – could be hampered in its attempts to stimulate investment in the sector by firms undermining collective bargaining deals.
And it urged the OGA to “get an early grip” on growing maintenance backlogs which threatened safety and the long-term future of North Sea production.
Det Norske Oljeselskap ASA, the oil company controlled by Norwegian billionaire Kjell Inge Roekke, deepened losses in the third quarter after booking an impairment due to lower crude-price assumptions.
Libya’s Petroleum Facilities Guard halted crude shipments from Zueitina port indefinitely amid the escalating conflict between the divided country’s two rival administrations, putting the OPEC member’s oil exports at risk.
Brazil’s daily oil production has fallen by about 500,000 barrels as oil workers strike for the third day to protest austerity measures by state-controlled Petroleo Brasileiro SA that are resulting in job losses, the country’s main oil union said Tuesday.
TransCanada Corporation has sent a letter to US Secretary of State John Kerry calling for the State Department to pause its review of the Presidential Permit application for the Keystone XL pipeline.
The company said it believes there is “sound precedent” for making the request.
Supernova Energy has started drilling on its Antle lease in Kentucky.
Three wells have so far been drilled to a depth of 1650feets as part of the farm-out agreement signed earlier this year.
