Energy Briefs

From
http://energybulletin.net/30576.html

Energy Briefs:

• OPEC increased crude production in May as higher output from some members including Algeria and the United Arab Emirates countered a drop in Nigerian production. May supply from the OPEC-10 countries was 880,000 bpd less than in October, or about 52 percent of the total production cut pledged.
• Venezuela and Vietnam signed a series of agreements last week to produce heavy crude and build a refinery in Vietnam.
• Germany and the European Commission reacted angrily to President Bush’s apparent change of heart on climate change, setting the stage for a stormy G8 summit of rich industrialized countries this week. "The declaration by President Bush basically restates the US classic line on climate change -- no mandatory reductions, no carbon trading and vaguely expressed objectives," said EU Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas.
• US oil and gas royalties are some of the lowest in the world, according to a US GAO report. Countries like Angola, Australia, and Egypt, and states like Wyoming, Alaska and California, all asked more for their resources than did the US federal government.
• The number of rigs drilling for oil and natural gas in North America rose by 36, or 1.9%, to 1,910, according to a weekly update issued by Baker Hughes Inc. The U.S. rig count was 117 units higher than a year ago, while the Canadian tally was down by 157 from last year.
• A spokesman for Imperial Oil says work on the proposed Mackenzie Valley gas pipeline is ongoing, despite comments Wednesday from Exxon Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson suggesting the project will be shelved. Speaking at the company's annual general meeting, Tillerson said it may abandon the long-delayed pipeline project if the Canadian government does not foot part of the bill.
• Russia's Federal Agency for Natural Resources has postponed for two weeks a decision on whether or not to revoke the license for a huge Siberian gas field controlled by BP’s Russian unit
• A consortium of several South Korean firms said it has confirmed the existence of a large offshore oil deposit in Russia's West Kamchatka region. The field, 40% owned by the South Korean firms and 60% by Russia's Rosneft, has an estimated 10 billion bbl of crude oil in place. A spokesman for the state-run firm said the field could provide South Korea—which imported 880 million bbl in 2006—with oil for more than a decade.
• The year-on-year decline in oil and gas production in the UK’s sector of the North Sea is continuing its decline. Oil production was down 5 per cent on the month at 1,403,005 barrels per day (bpd) and down 14 per cent on the year, while natural gas output production decreased 3 per cent and 6 per cent respectively to 8,581 million standard cubic feet per day (mmcfd).
• Toyota posted record sales of hybrids in the US in May 2007, with 36,101 units sold, up 110% on an unadjusted basis from May 2006. The increase is based entirely on sales of the Prius and Camry hybrids.
• The Dubai Mercantile Exchange, the Gulf sheikhdom's venture with Nymex Holdings, started crude oil futures trading last week, competing with Intercontinental Exchange in setting prices for Asian importers and traders.
• Talks between Iran’s nuclear negotiator and a top envoy for the EU ended late Thursday with few signs they were closer to breaking their deadlock over Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Javier Solana, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, said talks with Ali Larijani, the Iranian negotiator would start again within weeks.
• A cold snap in Argentina led to electricity and natural gas shortages last week, idling factories and taxis and causing sporadic blackouts in the capital. The coldest May since 1962 strained Buenos Aires' electrical grid for three nights, forcing authorities to slash power supply nationwide and briefly cut domestic natural gas exports to Chile.
• US economic growth slowed to 0.6 per cent last quarter in the worst performance for the economy in four years, according to the latest government estimates. The anemic performance was worse than economists expected but is likely to be viewed by the Federal Reserve as a prelude to a broad-based recovery.
• Angola's oil production is expected to increase to 1.8 million b/d at the end of this year as against current 1.4 million b/d, according to the official news agency ANGOP.
• California Governor Schwarzenegger and Ontario Premier McGuinty signed a Memorandum of Understanding on climate change. Under the accord, Ontario and California will partner to fight global warming by coordinating policies on low-carbon fuel standards. Ontario will require producers to reduce carbon emissions from transportation fuels by 10% by 2020.
• The US auto industry started rolling out a comprehensive campaign to convince Americans to oppose proposed increases in the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards, and to pressure their elected officials to vote down such proposals.
• Sales of electric bicycles have skyrocketed in China, now the global leader in this inexpensive form of motorized transportation. At least 1,000 companies have sprung up to meet the demand. Sales have almost doubled every year. Last year, Chinese bought 16 million to 18 million electric bicycles.
• AeroVironment announced that it performed a fast charge demonstration of a lithium chemistry electric vehicle battery pack. The 35kWh (kilowatt-hour) battery pack, designed to allow the truck to travel more than 100 miles on a single charge, showed the capability of being fully charged in less than ten minutes.
• According to Fortune Magazine, as gasoline prices hit an all time high of $3.227 Congress has taken the easy way out. Instead of doing anything substantive about the US' demand for gasoline, it has gone searching for phony villains - and found them in the personage of mysterious "price gougers."
• Japan's jet fuel exports have been rising as refiners focus more on exports amid weak domestic demand for oil products.
• With Texas, Washington and California leading the way, the U.S. is the fastest growing wind power market in the world, according to a report by the U.S. Energy Department.
  A new oil discovery in western China that may be a third of the size of PetroChina 's Jidong Nanpu is the country's biggest find in 50 years.
• China has discovered huge gas reserves in the southwestern province of Sichuan, and is hoping that the find will help ease growing concerns about energy security, state media reported Monday. A total of 3.8 trillion cubic meters (133 trillion cubic feet) of natural gas deposits have been found in the western part of the Sichuan Basin.