News and information on Shell PLC
By Russ Baker, AlterNet. Posted August 24, 2006.
EXTRACT: Other B-M clients have included… Royal Dutch Shell (charged with a massive financial fraud in a U.S. class action lawsuit brought by the UNITE National Retirement Fund and the Plumbers and Pipefitters National Pension Fund);
THE ARTICLE
They claim to be ‘centrists,’ but these D.C. Dems — whose corporate agendas aren’t too different from Bush administration policies — are living proof that the system needs fixing.
By KNUT EVENSEN in Stavanger
Shell is aiming to make about 15 “big cat” find this year, the same number it targeted in 2005. The supermajor defines a “big cat” as a discovery in which its equity interest is more than 100 million barrels of oil equivalent.
Speaking at the ONS conference in Stavanger, Shell vice president for exploration David Lawrence would not give details about results so far this year, but said: “We will drill roughly 15 big cats. We’re doing fine.”
Last year the supermajor also targeted 15 big cats in Australia, West Africa – particularly Nigeria – the Middle East and Gulf of Mexico. It made seven discoveries.
By Upstream staff
Militants in the Niger Delta oil patch threatened today to avenge the killing of at least 10 of their fighters and restated their aim to halt all the country’s crude exports.
The militants were killed during an attempt to free a hostage on Sunday night when their boat ran into a heavily armed military convoy on Brass Creek in the southern state of Bayelsa.
The hostage, a Nigerian Shell employee, was also killed in the fighting.
“Our response to Sunday’s killings will come at our time, but for certain it will not go unpunished,” the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend) said in an email to Reuters.
EXTRACT FROM POSTED COMMENT: It is therefore no surprise if, as appears to be the case, some senior Shell executives, such as Greg Hill, are troubled by their consciences. In my experience, Mr Brinded is not a man who will allow scruples or conscience to stand in the way of his ambition. The same ruthless attitude seems to apply to the lives of offshore workers.
THE ARTICLE
IAN FORSYTH
08:50 – 24 August 2006
One of the top bosses in Aberdeen with oil group Shell is being promoted to a post in Asia-Pacific, he confirmed at the ONS oil show in Stavanger yesterday.
IAN FORSYTH: 08:50 – 24 August 2006
Scotland Office Minister David Cairns defended the performance of the Health and Safety Executive in UK waters.
Mr Cairns, who was attending an ONS press conference yesterday, was asked if the HSE was up to carrying out its role, in light of recent criticism.
He replied: “I have no reason at all to doubt the competency of the HSE.”
In July, a union leader called for a thorough inquiry into the role of the HSE on North Sea oil and gas platforms.
By Estelle Shirbon
Abuja – Nigeria’s oil workers’ unions may pull their members from the Niger Delta over safety fears following a spate of abductions by militants and a military crackdown, the head of one of the unions said on Wednesday.
The two oil unions have called an emergency meeting after a bloody shoot-out on Sunday between troops and militants during a botched attempt to free a Nigerian hostage in the delta. The hostage, an employee of Royal Dutch Shell, was killed in the gunfight.
EXTRACT: The nation’s biggest coal company, China Shenhua Group, has teamed up with global technology leaders Royal Dutch Shell and South Africa-based Sasol on a joint study of coal-to-liquids projects in China, which aims to convert coal into 30 million tons of oil by 2020.
THE ARTICLE
China, the world’s second-biggest energy consumer, plans to spend 800 million yuan (US$100 million) over the next 10 years to study next-generation fuel, called natural gas hydrates, that could possibly ease the nation’s increasing reliance on oil imports in the long run.
Full Headline: Offshore Rigs in an Insurance Quandary Still Hampered By Hurricane Damage, Drillers Say Protection is Getting Scarce
Bloomberg
By Jim Kennett
The Deepwater Nautilus rig owned by Transocean should have spent the past two months drilling for oil and natural gas in the Gulf of Mexico, earning $220,000 a day. Instead, the vessel sat idle in a Texas shipyard.
Workers last week finished the latest round of repairs on the Nautilus: Hurricane Katrina tore the 50,277-ton rig from its moorings and Hurricane Rita grounded it almost a year ago. The 2005 storms have cost Transocean, the largest offshore driller, about $135 million in repairs, downtime and equipment upgrades.
EXTRACTS: At least 508,000 bpd, or about a sixth of Nigeria’s output capacity, have been shut in due to militant attacks and pipeline leaks this year, with its largest producer Royal Dutch Shell (RDSa.L) most affected.
Six foreign workers kidnapped in Nigeria were released on Wednesday, though the head of one of the country’s oil workers unions said the unions may pull their members from the oil-producing Niger Delta on safety fears following a spate of abductions.
THE ARTICLE
By REUTERS
Published: August 24, 2006
Filed at 3:44 a.m. ET
By David Robertson
August 24, 2006
BHP BILLITON, the world’s largest mining company, launched itself into competition with the oil and gas giants ExxonMobil, BP and Shell yesterday as it pledged to commit billions of dollars to the petroleum sector.
BHP, which announced record profits up 63 per cent to $10.5 billion (£5.6 billion), is planning to more than double its petroleum production within three years. Analysts regard this as a huge increase in an industry where the costs of raising production are measured in billions of dollars.
By 2009 the Anglo-Australian miner will have oil production equivalent to almost one fifth of BP’s current daily output. Its gas production will be equivalent to almost a quarter of the output of BP.
Published: Aug 24, 2006
THE world’s top oil companies are manoeuvring intently to win a stake in their oilfield of choice when Iraq finally opens to multibillion dollar investment.
From a safe distance, multinationals are poring over data from Iraq’s most promising oilfields and some of its older workhorses to gain the edge when the bidding begins.
Iraqi Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani has signalled the race for oilfield deals worth $20 billion could start this autumn. But oil men, noting a lack of security and investment law, are under no illusion that drilling is imminent.
EXTRACTS: …a licence was awarded to Statoil and its partner Shell, despite the opposition to Shell’s Corrib gas onshore pipeline in Mayo.
“We call for a full investigation into these licences and the tax deals that have been given to oil companies over the years.”
THE ARTICLE
By: Gabrielle Monaghan, Irish Times
Published: Aug 24, 2006
The Government is seeking expert independent advice as it undertakes a review of the way in which exploration licences are currently issued.
The move follows last week’s granting of four licences to companies, including Statoil, to explore for oil and gas off the Donegal coast. That announcement led to calls for a parliamentary investigation into how the State allocates licences and the benefits that accrue to large oil companies.
EXTRACT: In the wave of corporate scandals from Enron to Royal Dutch Shell, this pressure drove top executives to juggle the numbers in ways that boosted their own compensation packages.
By John Plender and Avinash Persaud
Published: August 24 2006 03:00 | Last updated: August 24 2006 03:00
In the Anglo-American model of capitalism the stock market imposes a ferocious discipline on managers of quoted companies.
For a start, the movement of the share price offers a minute-by-minute critical commentary on corporate performance and prospects. Quarterly results are closely examined by stock market analysts, fund managers and journalists, and there is an ever-present threat of hostile takeover. The credibility of top executives in this system depends on their generating consistent increases in earnings. They also have to develop the art of carefully guiding analysts’ expectations and subsequently “hitting the numbers”.
By Roman Olearchyk in Kiev
Published: August 24 2006 03:00 | Last updated: August 24 2006 03:00
Royal Dutch Shell has inked a small but strategically important gas purchase agreement in Ukraine with Poltava Petroleum Company, a subsidiary of UK-based JKX Oil & Gas.
The agreement marks the continued expansion of Shell into Ukraine, which has been dominated by Russian and Ukrainian companies.
JKX said in a statement that the agreement would give the Shell subsidiary a minimum of 250m cubic metres of gas over a 12-month period commencing in September.
EXTRACT: Ken Fisher, Shell’s senior vice-president of the strategy and portfolio division of its refining and marketing operations, expects biofuels to account for 7-15 per cent of global road transportation fuel volume by 2025, up from less than 1 per cent today.
THE ARTICLE
By Sheila McNulty
Published: August 24 2006 03:00 | Last updated: August 24 2006 03:00
After years of playing down the role of biofuels in the global energy markets, the world’s biggest oil companies are now building an industrial-scale infrastructure to support their growth.
By Neil Hume and Robert Orr
Published: August 24 2006 03:00 | Last updated: August 24 2006 03:00
A 5 per cent advance by Premier Oil set tongues wagging in the Square Mile yesterday.
Traders had expected the FTSE 250 exploration group to trade lower following news that the Chinguetti oilfield in Mauritania, west Africa, holds significantly less oil than originally believed. Premier owns an 8.1 per cent stake in the field.
However, after heavy trading, Premier shares closed 5.7 per cent higher at £10.42 amid talk it has received a £1bn, or £13-a-share, cash offer from Royal Dutch Shell, down 0.7 per cent to £19.34.
By Sheila McNulty in Houston
Published: August 24 2006 05:10 | Last updated: August 24 2006 05:10
BP, the UK oil giant, was forced to further reduce production from its Alaskan oil field on Wednesday, after it had to shut down a gathering centre due to a mechanical failure in a compressor.
That cut daily production from 200,000 barrels to 110,000 barrels, which is likely to have repercussions in the tightly-balanced oil market, which was rattled when BP last cut production from the field.
BP normally produces 400,000 barrels per day at the Prudhoe Bay oil field, but was forced several weeks ago to shut half the production after discovering ”severe corrosion” in an oil transit line.
Statistics recently published by the oil cartel OPEC show that Russia is currently extracting more oil than Saudi Arabia, making it the biggest producer of “black gold” in the world, the British Financial Times reported on Wednesday, Aug. 23.
OPEC statistics show that in the period since 2002 Russian companies have surpassed the Saudis as the world’s biggest oil producers on an on-and-off basis. The latest figures, however, have been hailed in Russia as evidence that such periodic production spikes are no one-offs and that Moscow really does have a right to lay claim to the number one spot.
From Chuks Akunna in Abuja, 08.24.2006
House of Representatives yesterday resolved to issue a warrant compelling Minister of State for Petroleum, Dr Edmund Dakoru, to appear before it to explain why Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC), allegedly under-paid the Federal Government $3.2 billion.
Reacting to a prayer by the House committee on Petroleum resources for “appropriate sanctions on the minister for aiding SPDC and deliberately refusing to appear before the committee,” the House resolved to, first, invite the minister before meting out the appropriate sanctions on both him and SPDC.
A $500,000 donation from Shell Oil Co. is allowing three new trailer-size ice plants to be installed in Chalmette and Cameron Parish for regional use.
By AMY WOLD
Advocate staff writer
Published: Aug 24, 2006
CHALMETTE — The grand opening of a new building Wednesday lured more than 100 spectators and merited a visit by Gov. Kathleen Blanco.
The building?
An ice machine.
That’s how important the rebuilding of fishing infrastructure is to communities in St. Bernard Parish and surrounding parishes.
Concern as Shell ready to resume work on pipeline
By Diarmaid Pléimionn
[email protected]
Shell says it hopes to resume work on its controversial gas pipeline in County Mayo next month after a delay of over a year due to an ongoing dispute with local residents.
The Anglo-Dutch petrochemical giant says it will re-route the pipeline away from houses of people including those of the Rossport Five, who went to jail last year for obstructing construction in breach of a court order.
The company has also announced that it is to offer local businesses contracts worth €5 million ($6.4 million) for services and work on the controversial pipeline. Protestors in Rossport near Bangor Erris in Mayo remain opposed to the project to pump unrefined gas at high pressure from the Corrib field in the Atlantic Ocean. The pipeline which is backed by the Irish government will pump gas at over 140 times atmospheric pressure, along a route which was to run as close as 80 yards from some homes in one of the most remote and beautiful areas of Ireland.
By CHRIS IKWUNZE, Port Harcourt, EMMANUEL OGOIGBE, Warri
No fewer than 60 militants in the Niger Delta were killed by the Joint Military Task Force in the last two days in a bid by the Federal Government to rid the area of spectre of hostage taking and criminality.
Ten were killed by members of the task force in Bayelsa on Sunday while 50 Ijaw insurgents lost their lives in a clash with soldiers at a border town between Delta and Bayelsa states Monday.
But the oil firms operating in the region have expressed concern at the renewed crack down, fearing that it could escalate hostage-taking and attacks on their facilities.
By John Donovan
The following comment was posted by guest 1731 on our “Live Chat” facility on 22 August 2006:
“The remarks in the Richard Wiseman story come across as being melodramatic. Do you have any proof that what you are saying is true? Have you not got anything positive to say about him or Shell?”
The following was my light hearted response:
“Guest 1731 thanks for your interesting and perfectly reasonable questions. Are you a colleague of Mr Wiseman or is this he in person? If so, we are honoured by your visit. In any event, we will respond in detail tomorrow. Suffice it to say that we do have proof about the agent activity (Mr Wiseman is already painfully aware of this fact.) With regards to positive comments, we will need time to put our minds to that challenge.”
This is my more serious response.
Sakhalin Energy has completed the construction of the first LNG loading berth in Russia, as the Company informs.
The berth for the loading of liquefied natural gas (LNG) is one of the integral elements of the LNG production plant that is under construction in the south of Sakhalin.
The berth can receive tankers with tonnage from 18,000 cubic meters to 145,000 cubic meters.
Sakhalin Energy is the operator of the Sakhalin-2 project. Under this project, the Piltun-Actokhskoye and Lunskoye Fields are being developed, their mineable reserves being 17.3 trillion cubic feet of gas and 1 billion barrels of oil.
Last Update: 6:15 PM ET Aug 22, 2006
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — The discovery of severe corrosion in BP PLC’s (BP) Prudhoe Bay pipeline system doesn’t warrant the introduction of new U.S. regulations, Royal Dutch Shell PLC’s (RDSB.LN) top U.S. executive said Tuesday.
BP earlier this month shut off about half of crude oil production from Alaska’s Prudhoe Bay, the largest producing field in the U.S., after finding a small oil spill caused by unexpectedly worn-out pipelines.
Wednesday 23 August 2006, 15:11 Makka Time, 12:11 GMT
Gunmen have kidnapped 17 oil workers this month
Nigeria’s oil workers’ unions are considering pulling all their members out of the Niger delta after a series of abductions.
Two oil unions have called an emergency meeting after the kidnappings of 17 workers, mostly foreigners, in the last month. Oil companies have imposed strict travel restrictions on their staff to try to keep them safe.
Government attempts to rescue a Nigerian hostage in the delta ended in a shoot-out on Sunday. Up to 10 members of the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta were killed and it is still unclear whether the hostage, an employee of Royal Dutch Shell, survived.
CEO says nations should open up more territory to satiate demand
Bloomberg News
Aug. 23, 2006, 12:28AM
Exxon Mobil Chief Executive Officer Rex Tillerson urged governments on Tuesday to open more territory to energy exploration to boost supplies and satisfy rising world demand.
“By providing timely access to resources, governments enable energy companies to bring the full extent of their technology and know-how to bear to new supply opportunities,” Tillerson said at a conference in Stavanger, Norway, according to a text of his remarks.
By Upstream staff
Oil prices edged lower to under $73 a barrel today, as world powers studied Iran’s offer of more talks to resolve a nuclear dispute before it leads to sanctions being imposed on Tehran.
US crude for October delivery was 30 cents down at $72.80 a barrel by 0255 GMT, after falling 20 cents yesterday. The September contract expired 18 cents up at $72.63 yesterday after a three-day rally. London Brent crude for October slipped 33 cents to $72.91 a barrel.
Last night Iran said its reply to a package of incentives by world powers contained ideas that would allow serious talks about its standoff to start straight away. But it was not clear whether the response went far enough to avert United Nations sanctions.
by KNUT EVENSEN in Stavanger
Photo by VASILIY BAZIUK/AP
ExxonMobil has put its 15% stake in BP’s Skarv field on the block, another signal that the Norwegian Sea is not a top priority for the US supermajor.
Sources told Upstream that the supermajor opened a data room for interested companies last week, and suggested that ExxonMobil is testing the market to see what kind of price it can fetch for its asset.
Through recent asset transactions, ExxonMobil has signalled that this part of the Norwegian continental shelf is not part of its future plans.
BLACK GOLD: Oil companies will have a major surplus of cash according to a new report
Sam Fleming,
23 August 2006
GLOBAL oil majors are set to generate an extraordinary £53bn of surplus cash in the next three years, Citigroup has claimed – some 11% more than between 2003 and 2005.
Yet this apparently favourable scenario masks a gathering crisis for many of the biggest oil players, as they find it ever harder to find new opportunities to put their profits to work and drive up value for shareholders.
By IAN MCDONALD and RUSSELL GOLD
August 23, 2006; Page C1
In today’s energy-stock sector, investors might want to borrow a credo from Watergate-era reporters: Follow the money.
Thanks to soaring energy prices, the world’s biggest oil and natural-gas companies are sitting on mountains of cash. Exxon Mobil Corp. had more than $32 billion in its coffers at the end of June — nearly equal to the combined stock-market value of General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. At the same time, Royal Dutch Shell PLC, Chevron Corp. and BP PLC had a total of more than $26 billion in cash.
• UK real estate billionaire John Whittaker’s Peel Holdings said it doesn’t plan to make a takeover offer for UK Coal.
• ExxonMobil chief executive officer Rex Tillerson urged governments around the world to open more territory to oil and gas exploration.
• Royal Dutch Shell’s Nigerian venture said an employee may have been hurt in a clash between soldiers and militants on Sunday, amid increasing violence in the Niger River delta region.
EXTRACT: At least 508,000 bpd or about a sixth of Nigeria’s output capacity has been shut in due to militant attacks and pipeline leaks this year, with its largest producer, Royal Dutch Shell (RDSa.L), most affected.
THE ARTICLE
By REUTERS
Published: August 22, 2006
Filed at 11:14 p.m. ET
SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Oil prices edged down to under $73 a barrel on Wednesday, as world powers studied Iran’s offer of more talks to resolve a nuclear dispute that could lead to sanctions against the world’s fourth-largest oil exporter.
BP may face charges over Prudhoe Bay
NICK BEVENS BUSINESS EDITOR
BP LOOKS set to be taken to court by the Alaskan authorities, after they raised the possibility of both criminal and civil action against the British oil giant over the closure of Prudhoe Bay, America’s largest oil field.
The state’s attorney-general, David Márquez, said yesterday he has created a task force in the Department of Law to review the state’s legal rights, “particularly the full extent to which BP and possibly other parties can be held legally responsible for losses incurred by the state”.
By Tom Cahill and Sonja Franklin Bloomberg News
TUESDAY, AUGUST 22, 2006
PARIS BP’s shutdown of the largest U.S. oil field may be the first of many, as decaying pipelines threaten to add to already soaring energy prices in the next decade.
“We’ll look back on this event as the Pearl Harbor Day in energy,” said Matthew Simmons, chairman of energy investment bank Simmons & Co. in Houston. The chance that the leaks and corrosion found at Prudhoe Bay in Alaska by BP, the British oil company, are an isolated occurrence is “zero,” said Simmons, who is writing a book on aging oil infrastructure.
EXTRACT: Andy Corrigan, a spokesman for Royal Dutch Shell Plc of The Hague, said maintenance spending has been “stepped up significantly in recent years.” He wasn’t more specific. Shell in February said its capital spending will rise 27 percent this year, to $19 billion. The company, the world’s second-largest oil company by market value, last month said production will be lower than expected.
THE ARTICLE
By Tom Cahill and Sonja Franklin
(Bloomberg) — BP Plc’s shutdown of the largest U.S. oil field may be the first of many, as decaying pipelines threaten to add 20 percent to energy prices in the next decade.
WASHINGTON, Aug. 22 (UPI) — The president of Shell Oil said Tuesday if Americans cut their gas consumption slightly, there would be a significant drop in prices.
However, said John Hofmeister, the current political leadership refuses to actively promote conservation as an antidote to high prices, despite industry briefings that lay out the potential savings.
“If we could conserve even 5 percent of gasoline we would see in a period of six to eight weeks a significant difference in the price of gas,” Hofmeister told the Infragard National Conference, a critical infrastructure protection convention in Washington. “The political leadership has chosen not to actively promote conservation. So we continue to produce to demand and that’s what keeps prices up,” Hofmeister said.
Last Update: 9:30 PM ET Aug 22, 2006
By Maya Jackson Randall and Ian Talley
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — Shell Oil Co. (RDSB) President John Hofmeister told reporters Tuesday the company is in talks with the U.S. Department of Interior to address concerns that some Gulf of Mexico drilling leases don’t require oil companies to pay royalties to the federal government.
Hofmeister said he’s interested in resolving the dispute and optimistic about being able to reach an agreement that could satisfy all parties, leaving open the possibility that the company would rework the flawed 1999 and 1998 leases to address U.S. lawmakers’ concerns.
By Peter Wilson
Aug. 22 (Bloomberg) — Chevron Corp., Total SA and Royal Dutch Shell Plc are among 13 companies that bought information packets for Venezuela’s auction later this year of four offshore natural-gas tracts, Petroleos de Venezuela SA said.
The 13 paid $350,000 apiece for the packets as a prelude to possible bidding in the auction, the Caracas-based company said in a press statement today.
Thirty-four companies were initially invited to participate in the auction.
Venezuela expects investment of $172 million during the next four years to develop the four blocks, which may have gas reserves of as much as 11 trillion cubic feet, Petroleos de Venezuela President Rafael Ramirez said earlier this month.
LOS ANGELES, Aug 22, 2006 /PRNewswire via COMTEX
In response to the oil companies’ lawsuit against Proposition 87 filed today, The California Clean Energy Initiative issued this offer of settlement.
Please note this settlement offer was sent to ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell and Occidental Petroleum, which are bankrolling the anti-87 campaign.
Dear Oil Company Executive:
We are writing to offer settlement of the lawsuit your agents filed against The California Clean Energy Initiative regarding the use of certain Web addresses. We will initially turn over to you the Web addresses in question provided you and your agents agree with our terms, which are as follows:
But eventually Canada’s oil seniors will be swept up by consolidation trend
Claudia Cattaneo, Financial Post
Published: Tuesday, August 22, 2006
Big, scrappy deals in Canada’s mining sector are giving oil investors a bad case of takeover envy.
The same forces that are driving consolidation in mining — a global scarcity of commodities — exist in energy today. Yet Canada’s oil and gas industry hasn’t seen a major deal since January, 2002, when Alberta Energy Co. joined PanCanadian Energy Corp. to form EnCana Corp.
22 August 2006
WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- The discovery of severe corrosion in BP PLC’s (BP) Prudhoe Bay pipeline system doesn’t warrant the introduction of new U.S. regulations, Royal Dutch Shell PLC’s (RDSB.LN) top U.S. executive said Tuesday.
BP earlier this month shut off about half of crude oil production from Alaska’s Prudhoe Bay, the largest producing field in the U.S., after finding a small oil spill caused by unexpectedly worn-out pipelines.
“The regulations are appropriate,” said Shell Oil Co. President John Hofmeister while speaking at an infrastructure security conference here. “The judgment of the methodology and technology relied upon was not sufficient, but I don’t think its warrants a complete review of regulatory authority. We have a robust system.”
EXTRACT: The gunfight broke out when the group, having taken possession of the hostage – an employee of Royal Dutch Shell – ran into a heavily armed convoy escorting supplies to an oilfield in the Brass Creek area of Bayelsa state.
ARTICLE
Tuesday 22 August 2006, 10:00 Makka Time, 7:00 GMT
The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) said that 10 of its fighters were killed during a botched hostage release in Nigeria late on Sunday.
The members of MEND – a coalition of groups that have staged a series of kidnappings and attacks on the oil industry in recent months – were involved in the release of a hostage when they claim that they came under fire from government troops.
By Sheila McNulty in Houston
US environmental investigators are examining allegations by employees that BP manipulated inspection data to avoid replacing pipelines at Prudhoe Bay, its 30-year-old Alaskan field, the Financial Times has learned. BP denies the allegations.
At the same time, in a separate move, Alaska’s attorney-general, David Marquez, has issued subpoenas to BP, as operator and an owner of the field, and its co-owners, “to preserve all documents that may be relevant to corrosion at Prudhoe Bay”, to conduct an investigation.
Associated Press
Report says EPA probing allegations by employees of energy giant
LONDON – British oil company BP on Monday denied allegations that it manipulated data from inspections of Alaska pipelines that were partially shut down earlier this month because of corrosion problems.
The Financial Times reported that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was probing allegations by BP workers that the company manipulated data to avoid replacing pipelines in the Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, oil field.
By Upstream staff
UK explorer JKX Oil & Gas has agreed to sell at least 8.75 billion cubic feet of gas over 12 months to a Shell unit in Ukraine.
The company said supplies would start this month following an initial delivery in August.
JKX said a statement that the gas sales pact had provisions to raise the amount of gas delivered and the time period allowed.
The agreement was made between JKX’s wholly owned Ukranian arm, Poltava Petroleum Company, and Shell Energy Ukraine, the company said.
By Upstream staff
Photo by AFP
Oil prices held steady at over $72 this morning after a two-day rally, as Iran vowed to press ahead with its nuclear programme, raising the prospect of sanctions.
US crude was 1 cent up at $72.46 a barrel by 0227 GMT, after surging $2.39 in the past two trading days. London Brent crude rose 10 cents to $73.48 a barrel.
Iran is due to give its reply today to a package on incentives by world powers that aims to end a nuclear standoff with the West, but Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei vowed yesterday that Iran would continue its path on nuclear energy.
EXTRACT: Shell has been having major problems with cost increases in a number of their projects around the world. For instance, in the Sakhalin LNG project earlier in the year they had to revise their costs from $10bn to $20bn.
THE TRANSCRIPT
Answers by Adrian Jackson, Energy Analyst, Investec
Q.
Why do you think the super majors are facing some rather unfavourable news flow at the present time?
A.
The thing is now with the majors is that obviously with high oil prices it’s very much in the mind of the public. They go to the petrol pump they see very high prices. They have high energy prices, gas and electricity prices at home. So these high prices are very much in their minds and they relate that back to the majors because that’s the public face of these high energy prices. So if you look at any adverse news coming out, immediately the press and the public will look at the super majors.
IAIN ESAU in Stavanger
Six companies were handed frontier exploration licences in a recent round covering the Slyne, Erris and Donegal basins off western Ireland, the Irish government confirmed.
In the round, major players Statoil and Shell were awarded licences including blocks 19/9 and 19/13 as well as part of Block 19/17 close to their Corrib gasfield in Quadrant 18.
Toronto-based Serica Energy landed 100% stakes in blocks 27/4, 27/9 and part of Block 27/5 in the Slyne Basin. Serica said it would reprocess about 300 square kilometres of 3D seismic data from the properties. If it opts to proceed to the second phase of the licence, it will drill at least one exploration well, it said.
By Upstream staff
Western Oil Sands is reported to have added brokerage Jardine Lloyd Thompson Canada (JLT) to its lawsuit over losses incurred during construction of the Athabasca Oil Sands project.
The lawsuit also names parent company JLT Risk Solutions, a leading insurance and reinsurance broker that operates in more than 30 countries, the Canadian Press reported.
The move is part of Western’s efforts to claim insurance arising from losses during the initial construction of the Athabasca project.
This is not a Shell website. That fact should be abundantly plain from the overall content of this home page and our sister Shell-focussed websites, including shellnazihistory.com. Click on the Disclaimer link at top of this page for more information. You Can Be Sure Shell does not endorse or approve of this website. There are no subscription charges nor do we solicit or accept donations. It is an entirely free to use website drawing attention to the negative side of Shell while also publishing positive news about the company. The Shell logo image with the white text used on this website, as per the above example, is in the public domain because its copyright has expired and its author is anonymous. It can be found on WIKIMEDIA COMMONS. Our shellenergy.website publishes Shell Energy customer complaints posted on Trustpilot where there is an ample supply. Use this link for Shell’s own website.
EBOOK TITLE: “SIR HENRI DETERDING AND THE NAZI HISTORY OF ROYAL DUTCH SHELL” – AVAILABLE ON AMAZON
EBOOK TITLE: “JOHN DONOVAN, SHELL’S NIGHTMARE: MY EPIC FEUD WITH THE UNSCRUPULOUS OIL GIANT ROYAL DUTCH SHELL” – AVAILABLE ON AMAZON.
EBOOK TITLE: “TOXIC FACTS ABOUT SHELL REMOVED FROM WIKIPEDIA – HOW SHELL BECAME THE MOST HATED BRAND IN THE WORLD” – AVAILABLE ON AMAZON.
Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honored associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honored personal guest would be rewarded with a private four day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
IN JULY 2007, MR BILL CAMPBELL (ABOVE, A RETIRED GROUP AUDITOR OF SHELL INTERNATIONAL SENT AN EMAIL TO EVERY UK MP AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS: 
MORE DETAILS:
MORE DETAILS: After a solicitor acting for Shell threatened to make the litigation "drawn out and difficult" with the intention of draining the resources of a financially weaker opponent, my late father (Alfred Donovan) and I decided to mount a wide-ranging campaign as a counter-measure. We jointly founded the Shell Corporate Conscience Pressure Group, which nearly 15% of Shell UK retailers joined. We regularly conducted ethical surveys involving up to 1500 Shell petrol stations. All responses were opened and authenticated by an independent solicitor who supplied Affidavits confirming the results. In whole page announcements in trade magazines (examples above) we challenged Shell to commission and publish the resuits of independent research asking the same questions and offering respondents GUARANTEED anonymity. Shell never took up the invitation. Instead it asked the UK Advertising Standards Authority to investigate our Shell surveys. No problems were found. The head-cut image of Alfred Donovan appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal. 
See our link list of over 500 articles by the FT, Wall Street Journal, Reuters, Bloomberg, Forbes, Dow Jones Newswires, New York Times, CNBC etc, plus UK House of Commons Select Committee Hansard records, information on U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission website etc. all containing references to our Shell focussed websites, or our website founders Alfred and John Donovan. Includes TV documentary features in English and German, newspaper and magazine articles, radio interviews, newsletters etc. Plus academic papers, Stratfor intelligence reports and UK, U.S. and Australian state/parliamentary publications, also citing our Shell websites. Click on this link to see the entire list, all in date order with a link to an index of over 100 books also containing references to our websites and/or our activities.
John Donovan, the website owner
A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
