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.
Meanwhile, Exxon Mobil’s $12.8 billion Sakhalin-1 project could fall short of planned output targets because of Moscow’s recent decision refusing to expand the project’s permit to develop a key oilfield, said an executive at Rosneft, the Russian state oil company that is a 20% partner in the project. “We will try to make it up, we don’t know yet if we can,” Rosneft’s Lev Brodsky said. The project’s current forecast is for production of around 12 million tons a year until about 2010, after which output will fall to around nine million tons, before rebounding toward 12 million around 2015 as new fields are brought on line.
Read Guy Chazan and Russell Gold’s article on Gazprom’s decision to go it alone at Shtokman:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB116040510029586901.html
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: 
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A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
