October 10th, 2006:

EXTRACT: The Putin government now contends that Total’s license to explore in the Arctic Circle and Royal Dutch Shell’s contract to develop natural gas in Sakhalin — on an island in Russia’s Far East — violate its environmental regulations, and that Exxon’s contract in Sakhalin doesn’t convey the rights the company believed it did. Besides, the terminal through which Exxon’s oil would pass on its way to market suddenly seems to the safety inspectors less safe than when they first approved it. read more

The Associated Press
Published: October 10, 2006
 
PORT HARCOURT, Nigeria Oil companies in Nigeria are being hit with rising costs due to kidnappings of their staff that have become so commonplace in the volatile Niger Delta one Nigerian company is selling T-shirts calling it the country’s “fastest growing business!”
 
For many though, it’s no joke. In the face of growing insecurity, companies trying to keep fearful staff from fleeing are paying more for insurance, salaries, perks and housing.
 
“My wife doesn’t want to bring our kids back,” said Scotsman Graeme Kerr, a general manager of two oil services companies whose family left the country after a Port Harcourt bar Kerr was in was attacked by gunmen in August. “Now I’m looking for some work outside of Nigeria.”
 
Kerr escaped the August attack by hiding under a table, but his best friend was seized by gunmen. Nearly 60 other foreigners have been snatched this year, 10 of them friends of Kerr. All were released unharmed.
 
Militant groups say they are fighting for a greater share of the region’s oil wealth, which has largely bypassed Delta inhabitants and ended up in the pockets of corrupt politicians. However, many say that what may have once been a politically motivated protest has degenerated into simple extortion, as splinter groups seize foreigners and demand cash from their companies for their safe return. Most companies deny they pay ransoms, although militant groups and the Nigerian government tell a different story.
 
In the latest violence Tuesday, attackers wielding automatic rifles overran a navy base and occupied a nearby oil facility, holding several troops and 60 Nigerian oil workers hostage in violence that trimmed crude output in Africa’s biggest producer.
 
“Our deployment allowance just got raised,” said one private security contractor working for a large oil services firm, referring to the extra money employees get for working in region designated as risky. He declined to discuss figures or let himself or his company be identified due to restrictions on speaking with the press, but said the financial impact of kidnappings was “huge.”
 
Apart from ransoms, which most companies deny they pay, “insurance goes up, and salaries, perks and housing all go up too to try to keep the staff,” he said.
 
The security contractor said companies had to balance profit against safety. He said his own company recently lost US$2.5 million on a project after he decided the risk of kidnapping was too high in that area and work had to be suspended. Five months later, it has still not resumed.
 
Antony Goldman, a London-based oil analyst, said that major oil firms were trying to shift some of the risk and the cost to subcontractors, but he played down fears oil companies would start pulling out of the lucrative region.
 
“Oil companies are farming out the risky jobs … but with oil at over $60 a barrel I think we’re a long way from any oil companies pulling out of the delta for risk reasons alone,” he said.
 
The volatility in Nigeria has helped push oil prices up.
 
Other daring raids recently include an attack on an oil platform over 40 kilometers (25 miles) offshore and a raid in which during which two guards were killed and seven foreigners were taken from a residential compound in Eket, Akwa Ibom state. Kerr said the attack, in a previously peaceful part of the country, was a watershed for him, showing “they can take people out of their houses anytime.”
 
Noticeboards on http://www.oyibosonline.com, the company selling the T-shirts, are full of reports of kidnappings, rumors of impending attacks, and foreigners chafing at curfews imposed by their companies.
 
Local businesses are suffering, too. Goodfella’s bar in Port Harcourt, popular with expatriates, said earnings were halved to US$1,500 a month because so many customers had company-imposed restrictions. Twenty-four Nigerian workers had been laid off.
 
Bisi Ojediran, a spokesman for a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell PLC, declined to comment on security or wages but confirmed that Shell-operated installations had had to shut down nearly half a million barrels of production per day due to militant attacks. Thirty percent of the lost revenue belonged to Shell, he said.
 
Analysts say the character of kidnappings has also changed. What were once mainly community-related disputes, typically carried out by lightly armed local people aggrieved over a lack of jobs or environmental degradation, have become far more serious. Attacks are now carried out by professional gangs using assault rifles, machine guns and even rocket propelled grenades. Few demand projects to benefit local communities, like light or water, or bother to issue even perfunctory political demands before asking for a ransom.
 
After a high of 18 foreigners taken in eight incidents in August, President Olusegun Obasanjo ordered a crackdown. The delta had a quiet September but many observers say the problem is flaring up again.
 
While most believe that there is little risk that a hostage will be executed, the risk of becoming caught in a crossfire is increasing. After a string of bloody attacks last week, the military in the creeks are jumpy, firing warning shots at approaching vessels.
 
In August, a Nigerian employee of Shell died during a botched rescue attempt, sparking a national strike by Nigerian oil workers. An American working for an oil services company, who asked that he not be identified because his former captors had threatened to kill him if he returned, recalled his abduction earlier this year.
 
“The militants had put us all into boats and we were leaving, when we kept hearing fire from our right side,” he said. “The army over at Forcados terminal were shooting at us. So we all ducked down and I was looking for water splashes, you know, bullets hitting the water. I didn’t see any, but we could hear the big 50 caliber.”
 
But the lure of wages 20 percent higher than he could make in the States brought him back. “It’s mostly the money, and it’s a good job,” he said with a smile. “It’s not Iraq just yet.”
 
 PORT HARCOURT, Nigeria Oil companies in Nigeria are being hit with rising costs due to kidnappings of their staff that have become so commonplace in the volatile Niger Delta one Nigerian company is selling T-shirts calling it the country’s “fastest growing business!”
 
For many though, it’s no joke. In the face of growing insecurity, companies trying to keep fearful staff from fleeing are paying more for insurance, salaries, perks and housing.
 
“My wife doesn’t want to bring our kids back,” said Scotsman Graeme Kerr, a general manager of two oil services companies whose family left the country after a Port Harcourt bar Kerr was in was attacked by gunmen in August. “Now I’m looking for some work outside of Nigeria.”
 
Kerr escaped the August attack by hiding under a table, but his best friend was seized by gunmen. Nearly 60 other foreigners have been snatched this year, 10 of them friends of Kerr. All were released unharmed.
 
Militant groups say they are fighting for a greater share of the region’s oil wealth, which has largely bypassed Delta inhabitants and ended up in the pockets of corrupt politicians. However, many say that what may have once been a politically motivated protest has degenerated into simple extortion, as splinter groups seize foreigners and demand cash from their companies for their safe return. Most companies deny they pay ransoms, although militant groups and the Nigerian government tell a different story.
 
In the latest violence Tuesday, attackers wielding automatic rifles overran a navy base and occupied a nearby oil facility, holding several troops and 60 Nigerian oil workers hostage in violence that trimmed crude output in Africa’s biggest producer.
 
“Our deployment allowance just got raised,” said one private security contractor working for a large oil services firm, referring to the extra money employees get for working in region designated as risky. He declined to discuss figures or let himself or his company be identified due to restrictions on speaking with the press, but said the financial impact of kidnappings was “huge.”
 
Apart from ransoms, which most companies deny they pay, “insurance goes up, and salaries, perks and housing all go up too to try to keep the staff,” he said.
 
The security contractor said companies had to balance profit against safety. He said his own company recently lost US$2.5 million on a project after he decided the risk of kidnapping was too high in that area and work had to be suspended. Five months later, it has still not resumed.
 
Antony Goldman, a London-based oil analyst, said that major oil firms were trying to shift some of the risk and the cost to subcontractors, but he played down fears oil companies would start pulling out of the lucrative region.
 
“Oil companies are farming out the risky jobs … but with oil at over $60 a barrel I think we’re a long way from any oil companies pulling out of the delta for risk reasons alone,” he said.
 
The volatility in Nigeria has helped push oil prices up.
 
Other daring raids recently include an attack on an oil platform over 40 kilometers (25 miles) offshore and a raid in which during which two guards were killed and seven foreigners were taken from a residential compound in Eket, Akwa Ibom state. Kerr said the attack, in a previously peaceful part of the country, was a watershed for him, showing “they can take people out of their houses anytime.”
 
Noticeboards on http://www.oyibosonline.com, the company selling the T-shirts, are full of reports of kidnappings, rumors of impending attacks, and foreigners chafing at curfews imposed by their companies.
 
Local businesses are suffering, too. Goodfella’s bar in Port Harcourt, popular with expatriates, said earnings were halved to US$1,500 a month because so many customers had company-imposed restrictions. Twenty-four Nigerian workers had been laid off.
 
Bisi Ojediran, a spokesman for a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell PLC, declined to comment on security or wages but confirmed that Shell-operated installations had had to shut down nearly half a million barrels of production per day due to militant attacks. Thirty percent of the lost revenue belonged to Shell, he said.
 
Analysts say the character of kidnappings has also changed. What were once mainly community-related disputes, typically carried out by lightly armed local people aggrieved over a lack of jobs or environmental degradation, have become far more serious. Attacks are now carried out by professional gangs using assault rifles, machine guns and even rocket propelled grenades. Few demand projects to benefit local communities, like light or water, or bother to issue even perfunctory political demands before asking for a ransom.
 
After a high of 18 foreigners taken in eight incidents in August, President Olusegun Obasanjo ordered a crackdown. The delta had a quiet September but many observers say the problem is flaring up again.
 
While most believe that there is little risk that a hostage will be executed, the risk of becoming caught in a crossfire is increasing. After a string of bloody attacks last week, the military in the creeks are jumpy, firing warning shots at approaching vessels.
 
In August, a Nigerian employee of Shell died during a botched rescue attempt, sparking a national strike by Nigerian oil workers. An American working for an oil services company, who asked that he not be identified because his former captors had threatened to kill him if he returned, recalled his abduction earlier this year.
 
“The militants had put us all into boats and we were leaving, when we kept hearing fire from our right side,” he said. “The army over at Forcados terminal were shooting at us. So we all ducked down and I was looking for water splashes, you know, bullets hitting the water. I didn’t see any, but we could hear the big 50 caliber.”
 
But the lure of wages 20 percent higher than he could make in the States brought him back. “It’s mostly the money, and it’s a good job,” he said with a smile. “It’s not Iraq just yet.” read more

10 October 2006

A cross-disciplinary UK consortium wins funding to develop a laser detection system that could be used to discover hidden fields of oil and natural gas.

A UK team is working on a £2.4 million ($4.5 million) project to develop an optical system based on quantum cascade lasers for oil and gas prospecting.

Comprising the III-V foundry Compound Semiconductor Technologies (CST), the Universities of Sheffield and Glasgow, Shell Global Solutions and laser system specialist Cascade Technologies, the consortium has received just over £1 million from the UK government’s Department of Trade and Industry (DTI). read more

MOSCOW, Oct 10 (Prime-Tass) — The Audit Chamber, Russia’s public spending and revenue watchdog, has asked the government to consider “streamlining” the costs of Sakhalin Energy’s Sakhalin-2 oil and gas project, the watchdog said Tuesday.

The Audit Chamber said that Sakhalin Energy’s plans to increase its spending targets for 2003-2010 to U.S. $22.2 billion from $12.04 billion were unjustified. However, it did not elaborate how the project’s costs could be streamlined. read more

October 10, 2006

LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) — Attackers overran a Nigerian navy base early Tuesday and occupied a nearby oil facility belonging to a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell PLC, taking several troops hostage, a police official said. A spokesman for the company said about 60 Nigerian oil workers also were being held.

No deaths have been reported, said Hafiz Ringim, police commissioner for Nigeria’s southern Bayelsa state. Ringim said the attackers were armed with assault rifles.

Bisi Ojediran, a spokesman for a subsidiary of Shell, said that around 12,000 barrels of production per day had been shut down as a result. He said around 60 staff members lived on the facility, which he described as a combination of a logistics base and oil pipeline hub. read more

10 Sept 2006

LAGOS (AFX) – Armed youths who seized a Shell flowstation earlier today in Nigeria’s Niger Delta have taken 60 workers hostage, the company said.

‘After firing some warning shots, the attackers took hold of the security post where they are holding some 60 SPDC (Shell Petroleum Development Company) and contractor staff,’ Shell said in a statement here. [email protected] afp/abr

Tue 10 Oct 2006 13:56:36 BST
(Updates with quote, details)

LAGOS, Oct 10 (Reuters) – The Nigerian unit of Royal Dutch Shell has shut in about 12,000 barrels per day of oil output at its Nun River facility after armed youths invaded the platform, a company spokesman said on Tuesday.

About 60 people were on the facility at Oporomur in the Southern Ijaw area of Bayelsa state, when it was seized early on Tuesday, the spokesman said. The authorities have been informed and are negotiating with the attackers to leave the platform. read more

10.10.2006
by John Stepek

Yesterday was just another normal day as far as the markets were concerned.

One of the world’s most genuinely unhinged regimes joined the nuclear club. North Korea, part of George W. Bush’s infamous ‘axis of evil’, said it had tested a nuclear bomb underground – and Japanese scientists had the seismic data to prove it.

But the FTSE 100 ended the day up nicely, well above the 6,000 mark. The Dow Jones continued to gain too. Markets in Asia were a little more wobbly, but were hardly knocked for six. read more

10 October 2006

Gazprom will develop the Stockman deposit without foreign partners. That sensational announcement was made yesterday by head of the monopoly Alexey Miller. Gazprom had announced its desire to exchange a share in the project for direct access to the domestic markets of Western countries. Under the new concept, Gazprom will develop the deposit independently and supply natural gas through the North European Gas Pipeline to Germany. This represents a change in Russian energy strategy. read more

Publish Date: Tuesday,10 October, 2006, at 09:29 AM Doha Time 
 
LONDON: Western oil companies who spent the past year haggling with Gazprom for a stake in its Shtokman gas field will be disappointed by the Russian group’s decision to develop the field alone, but analysts say it’s not all bad news for the oil and gas majors.

Gazprom had previously shortlisted five companies – France’s Total, Norway’s Statoil and Norsk Hydro and US oil companies ConocoPhillips and Chevron – as possible partners to develop Shtokman, one of the largest gas fields in the world. read more

Email to Mr Jeroen van der Veer, CEO, Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com

Tuesday 10 October 2005 

Dear Mr Van der Veer

The Moscow Times has published a news report this morning indicating a projected cost of $50 billion for the Sakhalin II project.

This is what happens when you rudely ignore a legitimate question from a long term Shell shareholder (me) – the cost doubles again.

I asked in a recent email which estimated project costing figure was correct: –

$20 billion: the official costing according to Shell. read more

Tuesday, October 10, 2006. Issue 3515. Page 5.

Royal Dutch Shell’s Sakhalin-2 project off Russia’s Pacific coast may cost as much as $50 billion, the Audit Chamber said Monday.

Operator Sakhalin Energy, which doubled expenses for the project’s second phase last year to $20 billion, may raise the cost of Sakhalin-2 once again, auditor Mikhail Beskhmelnitsyn said, Interfax reported.

Ivan Chernyakhovsky, a Moscow-based Sakhalin Energy spokesman, said he could not comment because it was unclear which figures the Audit Chamber was using. Sakhalin Energy has said it will spend $20 billion in the project’s second phase until 2014. read more

09.10.2006 09:43

The Russia’s Sakhalin-2 oil and gas project was plunged into further turmoil yesterday after the Kremlin said talks over Gazprom taking a stake in the project had stalled.

Royal Dutch Shell, the leader of the project, with a 55 per cent shareholding, faced the very real prospect of being stripped of a key environmental licence for its development of Sakhalin-2, throwing the future of the entire project into uncertainty.

Monday October 9th, 2006 / 16h57 
 
However the ruling by Judge Kimba Wood granted Shell’s application for other counts in the lawsuit to be dismissed, relating to extrajudicial killings, the right to life, and property destruction.

The original class action was filed September 2002 in the U.S.
District Court for the Southern District of New York by fourteen Nigerian victims, or relatives of deceased victims, of alleged human rights violations.

The complaint accuses the company of having knowingly facilitated attacks by the Nigerian military against unarmed residents after protests against Shell started in Ogoniland in 1992. read more

10 October 2006

Russia is looking more and more inhospitable, especially if you’re a Western energy company. Less than a month after Russian regulators threatened to pull a crucial permit for a multibillion-dollar energy project led by Royal Dutch Shell in Russia’s Far East, known as Sakhalin II, Gazprom said it would develop the nation’s massive Shtokman gas field on its own.

Blocked from access to most of the world’s remaining oil and natural-gas reserves, Western energy giants argue that they have unparalleled skills in project management and experience in handling complex undertakings. Gazprom’s decision to develop Shtokman on its own is evidence of the erosion of this argument, a trend with worrisome implications for Western companies. read more

EXTRACT: Those tensions are a further example of the troubles arising from European efforts to maintain national balance within multinational companies. Petroleum giant Royal Dutch/Shell, industrial group ABB and consumer-products giant Unilever have all stumbled in recent years in part because of split management that was guided as much by political forces as economic interests.

THE ARTICLE

By DANIEL MICHAELS
October 10, 2006; Page A1

The resignation of Airbus Chief Executive Christian Streiff after just three months on the job underscores the steep hurdles facing the big European aircraft maker as it tries to overcome damaging delays in its largest jet program and overhaul a cumbersome structure beset by politics and bureaucracy. read more

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL ONLINE
October 9, 2006 8:14 p.m.

After rising more than a dollar in early trading, crude futures finished up 20 cents at $59.96 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Reports that OPEC members agreed to cut output by one million barrels a day, and that North Korea completed a nuclear test, propped up prices. Here is Monday’s roundup of oil and energy news.

* * *
GAUGING OPEC: The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, looking to stem the erosion in the price of crude oil, has been urged to apply its anticipated 1 million barrel-a-day cut to real production, rather than its theoretical ceiling, Reuters reported. OPEC’s president, Edmund Daukoru, who is also Nigeria’s oil minister, wants responses by Oct. 10 to his plan to make the cut from group output. OPEC is concerned prices could go into freefall if members keep pumping at will. read more

By GREGORY WHITE
October 9, 2006

YUZHNO-SAKHALINSK, Russia — Exxon Mobil Corp.’s $12.8 billion Sakhalin-1 project in Russia’s Far East could fall short of planned output targets because of a recent government decision refusing to expand the project’s permit to develop a key oilfield, an executive at OAO Rosneft, the Russian state oil company that is a 20% partner in the project, said Monday.

The news comes amid growing pressure from the government on high-profile foreign-led energy projects on Sakhalin, alarming investors in what is widely viewed as part of an effort to win more favorable terms in the deals for Russia. read more

Published: Oct 10, 2006

SHELL Exploration Company has offered India’s state-owned Oil ‘ Natural Gas Corp a profit-sharing business model for productivity improvements in their exploration and production activities joint venture, writes Shirish Nadkarni in Mumbai.

ONGC is understood to be considering the Shell subsidiary’s proposal, based on a framework outlined by the energy major. The two companies have been holding high-level discussions on the issue.

It would appear that ONGC was not open to going beyond government prescribed norms on making joint investments and yielding operatorship of fields. read more

By: Auk and Fulmar assets sold by Shell and ExxonMobil as being no longer part of their core activities, writes Martyn Wingrove, Lloyds List: Published: Oct 10, 2006

TALISMAN Energy is expecting to increase reserves and oil production from the Auk and Fulmar fields after acquiring the assets from Shell and ExxonMobil.

The Canadian group hopes to start operating the two mature production platforms before the end of this year after signing a sales agreement with subsidiaries Shell UK and Esso Exploration and Production. read more

Published: Oct 10, 2006

ABILITY Group has launched a NKr79m ($12m) joint industry project with BP and Shell to test riserless drilling systems in deepwaters, writes Martyn Wingrove.

The company intends to perform a test on its latest riserless mud recovery system in water depths of up to 1,500 m on a BP or Shell well next year.

The technology, developed by subsidiary AGR Subsea, has already been proved to work in other petroleum provinces including the North Sea, off Sakhalin Island and in the Barents Sea. read more

(Murmansk is Russia’s only western all-year ice-free port)

There is a general perception that increasingly politics are driving these big energy deals

By Jorn Madslien
Business reporter, BBC News, Murmansk  

Just hours after the Arctic city of Murmansk celebrated its 90th birthday with a giant fireworks display in the town’s main square, its patriotic people have again good cause to fly the Russian flag.

The Russian energy giant Gazprom has said it will construct the world’s largest offshore gas field, Shtokman, on its own, thus dealing a huge blow to some of the world’s largest oil and gas companies, which had hoped to be parts of a consortium. read more

By: Tom Shiel,
Published: Oct 10, 2006

Protesters trying to prevent workers employed by Shell contractors from getting on to the 400-acre site of the proposed Corrib gas terminal in north Mayo staged a flying picket on a road a mile away.

Instead of picketing the main entrance to the site at Bellanaboy shortly after dawn yesterday, the protesters chose a location on the Bangor Erris to Bellanaboy road to stage a sit-down demonstration.

Some 100 demonstrators sat down on the road for about three hours from daybreak. read more

By Sheila McNulty
Published: October 10 2006 03:00 | Last updated: October 10 2006 03:00

One hundred and forty miles out into the Gulf of Mexico, the most high-tech drill ship in the world is drilling a well 4,300ft below the water.

The process is risky, expensive and time-consuming. It takes about 80 days and requires about 350 people to work at least 12-hour days in two-week shifts, monitoring the drilling of a well that reaches 19,000ft below the ocean floor.

The equipment being pushed down into the ocean from Transocean’s Discoverer Deep Seas ship must pass through a canopy of salt, and even the latest seismic technology cannot clearly reveal what is underneath. read more

By Neil Buckley in Moscow and Carola Hoyos in London
Published: October 10 2006 03:00 | Last updated: October 10 2006 03:00

Gazprom said yesterday it would develop Russia’s massive Shtokman natural gas field alone – and switch eventual output from the US to Europe – dashing the hopes of foreign companies vying for stakes in the $20bn project.

Alexei Miller, chief executive, told Russian television the monopoly had decided against offering 49 per cent of Shtokman to five short-listed international groups because they had been unable to offer suitable assets in exchange. read more

By ANDREW E. KRAMER
Published: October 10, 2006

MOSCOW, Oct. 9 — Gazprom, Russia’s natural gas monopoly, abruptly broke off talks Monday with five international companies bidding for a stake in an offshore field in Russia, canceling the largest energy deal involving foreigners expected here this year.

Gazprom’s chief executive, Aleksei B. Miller, said his company would wrest natural gas from the challenging field without foreign help — though energy analysts were skeptical — and retain full ownership of a gas deposit that is one of the world’s largest untapped sources of energy. read more