New pledge over $7bn pipeline
NEW DELHI: India and Pakistan have renewed their commitment to a controversial pipeline that will supply Iranian gas to their two countries and said they would pursue the project sincerely and seriously.

The countries are in talks with Tehran to buy natural gas to be transported through an ambitious $7 billion pipeline that has been opposed by Washington.
Basra exports rise
LONDON: Iraq’s crude oil exports rose in March to their highest rate since September 2006 due to increased shipments from Basra, its main terminal, shipping sources said.
Exports in March climbed to 1.62 million barrels per day from 1.49 million bpd in February, according to shipping data. That was the most since 1.64 million bpd last September.
KS Energy venture
SINGAPORE: Singapore's KS Energy Services said it had formed a joint venture to build a $148 million offshore oil drilling rig at a Middle East shipyard.
KS Energy said it will have a 50 per cent stake in the joint venture firm with Amwal Al Khaleej Investment and Maritime Industrial Services (MIS).
The shallow water jack-up rig would be built at a shipyard in Sharjah, owned by MIS which would have a 10 per cent stake in the joint venture.
ILF wins UAE contract
DUBAI: International Petroleum Investment Company (IPIC) has awarded Germany’s ILF a contract to build a pipeline that would allow more than half of the UAE's crude exports to bypass the Strait of Hormuz.
The new 1.5 million bpd, 320 km pipeline would link Abu Dhabi National Oil Company’s s Habshan oilfields to the port of Fujairah, a major ship bunkering hub for vessels entering and leaving the Strait.
PetroChina in transport tie-up
HONG KONG: The parent of China Shipping Development and PetroChina plan to set up a venture to transport liquefied natural gas, furthering Beijing’s campaign to boost useage of the cleaner fuel.
Li Shaode, president of China Shipping (Group) Co and chairman of the listed firm, said the unlisted state-run parent would be the second such firm, after the Cosco group and offshore oil specialist CNOOC set up a similar venture.
“The investment will be big,” he said. “Returns will be steady.”
Bohai Bay hope
BEIJING: PetroChina, China’s leading oil producer, estimates the reserves of an oilfield it has recently discovered in Bohai Bay, eastern China, at 2.2 billion barrels, according to Xinhua news agency.
The field is China’s biggest oil discovery in a decade. Its estimated output is equivalent to 5.4 per cent of China's total crude production in 2006, Xinhua quoted sources with the company as saying.
The Nanpu block, partly offshore, covers an area of 1,300-1,500 square km and expects to produce light crude.
MISC success
PASIR GUDANG, Malaysia: Malaysian shipper MISC aims to ramp up revenue from its oil-rig engineering business after building its first deepwater oil-production platform, its chief executive said.
MISC, the world’s largest carrier of liquefied natural gas, expects to more than triple the revenue contribution from its oil-rig business by 2012, Shamsul Azhar Abbas said.
Rosneft controls
MOSCOW: Russian state oil firm Rosneft has taken control of a joint venture with China’s Sinopec based on Russia’s Pacific oil hub, Sakhalin Island, Rosneft said.
Rosneft said in a statement that the two companies signed an operating agreement governing their Sakhalin-3 Veninsky oil project last month.
Constructive talks
TOKYO: China and Japan held constructive talks on disputed gas fields in the East China Sea although big gaps remain in their positions, a Japanese Foreign Ministry official said.

Ceypetco to lift crude from Iran
SINGAPORE: Sri Lanka’s Ceylon Petroleum Corp. (Ceypetco) has issued its second tender for a Very Large Crude Carrier (VLCC) on a voyage charter basis in late April to lift crude from Iran, a tender document showed.
The charterer of the tanker will load about 135,000 tonnes of Iranian Light crude from Iran’s Kharg Island terminal, which belongs to the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC).
Amuay revamp
CARACAS: Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA has taken crude distillation unit Number 4 of the Amuay refinery offline for planned maintenance, a refinery source said.
PDVSA earlier said it would soon perform maintenance on the unit of the 640,000 barrel per day (bpd) refinery, but did not provide a timeframe.
Amuay and the 300,000 bpd Cardon refinery form the giant 940,000 bpd Paraguana refining centre.
Expansion delayed
HOUSTON: Valero Energy has pushed back by a year a planned expansion of crude processing capacity at its 215,000 barrel per day (bpd) refinery in Quebec, according a regulatory filing.
Valero said it moved the 50,000 bpd expansion of the refinery’s 171,000 bpd crude unit to 2008 as a 'capital discipline' effort to improve returns to investors, according to slides prepared for a management presentation and filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
ONGC tenders
SINGAPORE: India's Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) has issued tenders to sell a naphtha cargo each for April and May, helping the country to boost exports in April back to its 2006 monthly average, documents showed.
ONGC has offered 35,000 tonnes for April 16-18 loading from Jawahar Lal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT) in Mumbai, pushing India’s April naphtha exports up to 520,000 tonnes.
Operating permit
NEW YORK: Murphy Oil has filed to modify the operating permit for its 120,000 barrel per day refinery in Meraux, Louisiana, to allow it to revamp two units to make cleaner fuel, regulators said.

Technip wins pipes contract
PARIS: Technip has won a contract from Shell to install pipes to help the oil company develop the Ursa and Princess fields in the Gulf of Mexico, the French energy services company said.
The contract involves project management, engineering, fabrication and installation of water injection flow lines, risers as well as installation of pipeline end terminations, Technip said in a statement.
Gazprom sales blow
MOSCOW: Russia’s Gazprom’s exports outside the former Soviet Union fell in the first two months of 2007 by 18 per cent year-on-year, the Energy Ministry said.
The world’s largest gas company, which supplies a quarter of Europe's gas, exported 25.19 billion cubic metres of gas to Europe including the Baltic States in January-February, the ministry said citing its own and customs data.
Jura gasfield hope
PARIS: Total has launched the development of the Jura gas and condensate field in the North Sea, which should come on stream in the second quarter of 2008, the French energy giant said.
Jura, a discovery made in November, is expected to produce around 45,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day at plateau, Total said in a statement.
Prosafe dividends
OSLO: Norwegian offshore services group Prosafe said it will propose increasing its dividend in 2007 and 2008 to at least 5 crowns per share.
“The board will propose a divided plan which should yield total payments of at least 5 crowns per share in 2007 and 2008, followed by a dividend pay-out ratio of approximately 75 per cent of net profits,” Prosafe said in a statement.
PDVSA figures
CARACAS: Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA expects its crude oil production to reach 2.97 million barrels per day this year, according to the company’s 2007 budget published in the official gazette.
Market observers say PDVSA’s output is considerably below official production figures, and that Venezuela’s total output is only around 2.6 million bpd compared with government production figures of around 3.3 million bpd.

Dividends approved
RIYADH:  Shareholders of Saudi Basic Industries Corp (Sabic) approved a dividend of 2.50 riyals ($0.67) for the second half of 2006, the company’s chief financial officer said.
The payment brings the total 2006 dividend to 4 riyals per share, down 13 per cent from 2005, for the company.
$16m package
NEW YORK: Halliburton chief executive David Lesar raked in more than $16 million in compensation in 2006, when the company’s earnings fell slightly.
Lesar, who plans to move to Dubai as the company opens a new headquarters in the Middle East, was paid a salary of $1.3 million, $6.6 million in incentive-based compensation, and $7.5 million of stock and option awards.
Agility buys firms
DUBAI: Kuwait’s Agility said it had bought two companies in Australia and New Zealand for A$83 million ($67.6 million).
Agility has acquired the remaining 75 percent of New Zealand’s freight company LEP International that it did not already own from Mainfreight for about A$67 million, the company said in a statement.
New Zealand-based Mainfreight also sold Australian firm Pan Orient to Agility for A$16 million.
RasGas delivery
DOHA: Ras Laffan Liquefied Natural Gas Company Limited (II) (RasGas) recently made its first delivery of liquefied natural gas (LNG) under a long-term sales and purchase agreement from the shores of Qatar to Zebrugge, Belgium.
Petrobras worry
RIO DE JANEIRO: The US is worried about the growing business activities in Iran of Brazil’s state-run oil firm Petroleo Brasileiro SA (PBR), or Petrobras, the Brazilian newspaper Valor said.
Clifford Sobel, US Ambassador to Brazil, recently met Petrobras' chief executive Sergio Gabrielli to discuss the issue, the newspaper said.

Quick takes

Gail to invest $4.1bn
NEW DELHI: Gas transporter Gail (India) plans to invest 180 billion rupees ($4.1 billion) over the next five years in new pipeline projects, chairman U D Choubey said.
The investment would boost revenues to 58 billion rupees by 2011/12 from 20 billion in the current year, he said.
The company will build new pipelines totalling 5,000 km  to enhance Gail’s gas transportation capacity to 280 million standard cubic metres per day (mmscmd) from the current 145 mmscmd, the chairman said.
BP oil traders join top bank
LONDON: At least 13 BP oil traders have left the company, most of them from the oil major’s European operations, market sources said.
Oil traders in London said around 11 European crude oil and oil products traders had left, with another two traders – both dealing in distillates – leaving the company’s Singapore desk.
US trading sources said the total number of departing BP oil traders could be as high as 16.
European oil products traders said a number of London-based BP gasoline traders had left to join a Wall Street bank.
They said one London-based naphtha dealer had moved to Barclays Capital, the investment banking arm of UK lender Barclays.
They said London-based crude oil and fuel oil traders had also left BP.
Italy talks on LNG projects
RAVENNA, Italy: Italy could implement four or five of the dozen liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects under discussion, Industry Minister Pierluigi Bersani said.
“We have about a dozen LNG projects under discussion,” he said at an energy conference. “I believe that four or five of those 12 will be implemented.”
India issues $1.13bn bonds
BOMBAY: India has issued oil bonds worth 49.71 billion rupees ($1.13 billion) to three state-run oil retailers to compensate them for selling petroleum products at below market prices, the central bank said.
Indian Oil Corp has been given bonds worth 29.56 billion rupees, Bharat Petroleum got 9.97 billion rupees and Hindustan Petroleum got 10.18 billion rupees.

ENVIRONMENTAL EYE

UK greenhouse gas emissions rising
LONDON: Britain's greenhouse gas emissions rose last year, the government said, despite the country's claims to be a world leader in the fight against climate change.
Emissions of the total basket of six greenhouse gases covered by the Kyoto Protocol on global warming last year rose 0.5 per cent to 658.1 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent.
Production of the commonest man-made greenhouse gas carbon dioxide was also up, by 1.25 per cent year on year, mostly because power stations switched to high-carbon coal from gas because of higher gas prices.
Britain claimed recently that 'international landmark' proposals to introduce legally binding emissions targets.
'While these figures are provisional, they underline why concerted effort to tackle climate change, both from Government and wider society, is absolutely critical,' said environment minister David Miliband.
'Any increase in carbon dioxide emissions is worrying.'
The figures were based on emissions from Britain, and excluded emissions cuts overseas that UK companies had funded to help them meet targets under the European Union's emissions trading scheme.
Under its Climate Change Bill earlier this month, the government proposed a legally binding target of a 60 per cent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions below 1990 levels by 2050.
Britain is still on course to meet its obligations under Kyoto to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 12.5 percent on 1990 levels by 2012.
'We're still on track to almost double our Kyoto commitment, with an estimated 23.6 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions on 1990 levels by 2010, and we expect the long-term downward trend to continue,' said Miliband.
Net carbon dioxide emissions rose to 560.60 million tonnes in 2006, but were down 5.25 percent from 1990, according to the preliminary data.
 Figures did not include international aviation and shipping emissions.