March 10th, 2008:

March 10, 2008: 08:23 AM EST

LONDON -(Dow Jones)- At least one private equity firm has expressed interest in a lubricants joint-venture put on the market by Royal Dutch Shell PLC ( RDSB.LN) and ExxonMobil PLC (XOM), a person familiar with the matter said.

The news comes as the two owners -which each control 50% through units- said Monday they would be discussing the possible sale of the venture, Infineum, with several potential buyers.

Shell and ExxonMobil last year started to look at a sale of the venture as a possibility. But they said Monday that “no divestment decision has been made.” read more

10 Mar 2008 

ExxonMobil Chemical, a division of ExxonMobil Corporation and Shell Chemicals Limited, an affiliate of Royal Dutch Shell plc announced today that, as part of the study to review strategic options for the Infineum additives joint venture, they have agreed to evaluate market interest and will be discussing Infineum with several potential buyers. 

This study is part of an ongoing strategic assessment of the business and opportunities for growth, restructuring, or divestment depending upon fit with overall strategic business objectives. read more

March 10, 2008: 09:03 AM EST

LONDON, Mar. 10, 2008 (Thomson Financial delivered by Newstex) — Royal Dutch Shell PLC (NYSE:RDS A) has fully restored the operations of the Bacton gas terminal in the UK, a company spokesman said.

The facility, which supplies 10 pct of Britain’s gas needs, was shut on Feb 28 when a fire broke out at the waste water system. Partial operations resumed early last week.

The Shell spokesman said the terminal is now running at ‘full operational level’, with daily flow rates of over 28 mln cubic metres. read more

10/03/2008

The FINANCIAL — ExxonMobil Chemical, a division of ExxonMobil Corporation and Shell Chemicals Limited, an affiliate of Royal Dutch Shell plc announced on March 10 that, as part of the study to review strategic options for the Infineum additives joint venture, they have agreed to evaluate market interest and will be discussing Infineum with several potential buyers.

This study is part of an ongoing strategic assessment of the business and opportunities for growth, restructuring, or divestment depending upon fit with overall strategic business objectives.   read more

Tony Perry / Los Angeles Times
ECONOMIC LIFEBLOOD: After falling into disrepair and being bombed, the K-3 refinery is getting attention and investment in the hope that it will contribute to Iraq’s future productivity.

Helping restore a 1930s oil facility will take local planning and teamwork.
By Tony Perry, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
March 10, 2008

HAQLANIYA, IRAQ — — The ragged oil refinery in a barren corner of Anbar province looks more like something out of a post-apocalyptic Mel Gibson movie than the centerpiece of an ambitious energy project. read more

By Daniel Whitten

March 10 (Bloomberg) — Record oil-company profits, gasoline prices over $3 a gallon and the threat of a U.S. recession are increasing Democrats’ prospects for taxing oil and gas producers to pay for wind, solar and conservation programs.

Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp. and ConocoPhillips reported earnings of almost $10 million an hour in the fourth quarter. The economy appears headed toward the first contraction in a presidential election year since 1980. Democrats will probably raise taxes on the oil companies by at least $1.8 billion a year by 2009, senators in both parties say. read more

By Angela Macdonald-Smith

March 10 (Bloomberg) — Chevron Corp., operator of the Gorgon liquefied natural gas venture in Western Australia, started studies on a separate project in the same region, potentially blocking rival plans by Woodside Petroleum Ltd.

The Wheatstone project will tap fuel from a 100 percent- owned field to produce 5 million metric tons a year of LNG at a site on mainland northwest Australia, the San Ramon, California- based company said today in a statement. The plan doesn’t lessen the commitment to the delayed Gorgon project, it said. read more

By Amanda Battersby

The world’s gas industry is booming, with demand for the fuel increasing in many markets, but the opportunities this growth offers for new projects and expansions is matched by technical challenges and escalating costs, delegates at the keynote session of the Gastech 2008 conference were told.

Costs for liquefied natural gas projects have increased by up to three times since the start of the decade, said Brunei Darussalam Minister for Energy Paduka Bakar.

His sentiments were echoed by Shell Gas & Power executive vice president Asia Pacific Jon Chadwick who noted that costs are “rising relentlessly”. read more

By Mark Hillier

Anglo-Dutch supermajor Shell has unveiled plans to develop a generic floating liquefied natural gas production unit that will have capacity of 3.5 million tonnes per annum.

Jon Chadwick, executive vice president Asia for Shell Gas & Power, told the Gastech conference that the supermajor had devoted “substantive engineering hours to FLNG” and had come up with a design for a vessel that would be as much as 450 metres long and 75 metres wide.

The vessel will also have extra hydrocarbon liquids capacity. read more

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Crude Awakening: Analysts Adjust

Predictions Revised
As Prices Stay High;
A Call for $200 Oil
By GREGORY MEYER and BRIAN BASKIN
March 10, 2008; Page C2

A two-week string of record oil prices has left prognosticators at banks and brokerage firms struggling to keep pace.

With crude futures trading firmly above $100 a barrel, oil economists are revising their forecasts — up.

Oil has traded at an average price of $95.12 a barrel this year on the New York Mercantile Exchange, up 65.5% from the start of last year. That has left many analysts’ forecasts in the dust. Lehman Brothers, for example, recently boosted its first-quarter forecast for benchmark Nymex crude to $93 a barrel, up $7 from its earlier outlook. The bank sees oil averaging $86 this year, but acknowledges the pitfalls it’s facing. read more

By Ed Crooks, Financial Times
Published: Mar 10, 2008

You could tell that something had changed in the world’s natural gas markets when British consumers were told their bills were rising because of an earthquake in Japan.

In a recent round of price rises by most of the main domestic energy suppliers in the UK, one of the factors cited was that expected imports of liquefied natural gas had been diverted to Japan instead.

The earthquake in July that forced a shutdown in a nuclear power plant meant that gas-fired power stations were running for longer, pushing up the price of gas in Japan. If suppliers could obtain about 80p a therm in the Japanese market, why would they settle for 55p or so in the UK? read more

By Ed Crooks, Financial Times
Published: Mar 10, 2008

The liquefied natural gas industry today resembles the oil industry in the 1950s, according to some observers.

It is dominated by a few large international companies that can afford the massive investments that are required, and the business model is based on contracted deliveries along fixed routes from the wells to the market.

Today, oil is a highly liquid global market. The question is whether LNG will go the same way over the coming decades.

There is no doubt that the LNG market is developing very rapidly. read more

By Ed Crooks
Published: March 10 2008 02:00 | Last updated: March 10 2008 02:00

Linda Cook, Royal Dutch Shell’s executive director for gas and power, does a great sales pitch for the merits of natural gas.

“It is available today; it’s relatively cost-competitive, and it is the most environmentally-friendly of all of the hydrocarbon energy sources,” she says.

“We see demand for natural gas continuing to be robust and growing at a higher rate than that for oil in the coming years.” read more