Category:

WTI Gains On Stockpiles

West Texas Intermediate rose for a second time in three days after an industry report showed crude stockpiles declined in the U.S., the world’s biggest oil user. Brent climbed in London . Futures advanced as much as 0.4 percent in New York . Crude supplies shrank by 5.5 million barrels last week, the American Petroleum Institute was said to report yesterday. Data from the Energy Information Administration today is projected to show inventories slid by 1.55 million, according to a Bloomberg News survey . Kurdish oil exports remain unaffected by the turmoil in Iraq , producer Genel Energy Plc said. “There is a possibility that the market is starting to develop a bit of a range around here,” said Ric Spooner, a chief strategist at CMC Markets in Sydney who predicts investors may sell West Texas contracts if prices climb to about $98.70 a barrel. “Iraq looks to be […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Natural-Gas Prices Jump to Two-Week High on Warming Weather Forecasts

Natural-gas prices closed at a two-week high as warming weather forecasts encouraged an end to aggressive selling, analysts said. Prices for the front-month September contract settled up 6.3 cents, or 1.6%, to $3.897 a million British thermal units on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The gains broke gas out of a 17-cent trading range it had stayed in since July 21, with nearly all of the gains Tuesday coming within a few minutes after the trading floor opened at 9 a.m. Analysts are saying the move likely confirms an end, or at least a break, in the steep selloff gas had seen for most of the summer. Prices dropped 21% between June 12 and July 23, which should have enticed more power generators to switch from coal to gas, several analysts have said. The weather has also stabilized. Much of the country is still likely […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Kurds Ask US Court To Scrap Seizure Order, Allow Crude Delivery

The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) of Iraq asked a U.S. court on Monday to throw out an order to seize some 1 million barrels of disputed crude oil and allow the cargo to be freely delivered in Texas. The United Kalavrvta tanker, carrying about $100 million worth of Kurdish crude, has been anchored near Texas for nine days, as the Iraqi region of Kurdistan wages a legal battle over ownership with the central government of Iraq. At the request of Baghdad, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas ordered the U.S. Marshals Service to take control of the cargo last week, but then said the tanker was outside its jurisdiction and beyond U.S. territory in the Gulf of Mexico. KRG said the court lacked the authority to sign the order in the first place, claimed the right to export oil under […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Podesta plays matchmaker for estranged US, Iraq

Podesta plays matchmaker for estranged US, Iraq Sunday, Aug. 3, 2014 | Julian Pecquet, Congressional Correspondent The United States and Iraq both hoped they’d be seeing a lot less of each other when the last American troops left the country in 2011. Instead, they find themselves in intensive couples counseling as they try to save a failing marriage of convenience that could hold the key to defeating the biggest terrorist threat since al-Qaeda. With Sunni militants threatening to tear the country apart, Baghdad turned to Democratic super-lobbyist Tony Podesta early last year to encourage the US government to get back in the fight. It has been a tough sell for the administration of President Barack Obama, who had boasted of pulling the United States out of Iraq, but rapid gains by the Islamic State group (IS) over the past few weeks have forced a re-evaluation. Obama vowed in a June […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Iraq’s Yezidi minority faces massacre

Many thousands of members of Iraq’s Yezidi minority in Ninewa province are likely to die unless they can be rescued from extremist militants. Iraq’s Yezidi minority faces massacre A refugee camp in Kurdistan houses members of Iraq’s ethnic Yezidi minority, who fled from ISIS. (PATRICK OSGOOD/Iraq Oil Report/Metrography) Ali Haji Ali is one of at least 10,000 civilians stranded on a mountain in northern Iraq, following a weekend offensive by Sunni extremists. Without food, water, or shelter, he and his family face a stark choice: die a slow death by starvation and dehydration, or descend the mountain and face militants who have sworn to exterminate them."We have been trapped here on the Sinjar Mountain for three days now,” Ali said, speaking by telephone on Aug. 4. “ISIS has blocked our escape route to K… This content is for registered users. Please login to continue. If you are not a […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Kurdish Pipeline Exports Unaffected by Iraq Turmoil

The largest oil producer in Iraqi Kurdistan is confident that the region will maintain independent pipeline exports unimpeded by the violence and political turmoil engulfing the country. The Kurdistan regional government has loaded five cargoes in Ceyhan, Turkey , and two have been sold and paid for, Julian Metherell, chief financial officer at Genel Energy Plc (GENL) , said in an interview today. One went to Singapore and one to Israel , he said. A third is docked off the U.S., where it’s the subject of a legal dispute with Iraq ’s federal government. Genel, the London-based explorer led by former BP Plc (BP/) Chief Executive Officer Tony Hayward , said that production rose to a record level in the first half and operations haven’t been affected by the fighting between Islamic militants and the Kurdish military known as Peshmerga. The company expects to export more than 20,000 barrels […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Oil crisis solved, Libya says

The Libyan government has managed to resolve its oil crisis and all ports are in operation, the Libyan prime minister said from Washington. Libyan Prime Minister Abdullah al-Thinni met with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry in Washington for the U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit as his administration took steps to end a period of political change. The new parliament met for the first time Monday about 900 miles east of Tripoli, where pro-government forces are battling heavily armed militias. Thinni said he valued Washington’s role in helping bring stability to the region, including a decision to raid a vessel loaded with oil taken from rebel-held territory earlier this year. "As a result, the Libyan government has managed to solve the crisis of the oil," he said in a statement Monday. "We have four oil ports that are able to export oil." Data provided by the Platts energy news service show […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

New clashes break out in Lebanese border town

Fighting erupted Wednesday in a Lebanese border town held by Islamic extremists from neighboring Syria after a negotiated truce collapsed overnight. Muslim clerics launched new efforts to broker another cease-fire in what has been the most serious spillover from Syria’s civil war. The initial truce, brokered on Tuesday, was meant to end days of fighting in the eastern town of Arsal and allow for negotiations for the release of captive Lebanese soldiers. According to the Lebanese National News Agency, clashes broke out again after Syrian militants in Arsal opened fire on Lebanese troops early Wednesday and then spread through several fronts across the predominantly Sunni town. Later in the morning, a delegation of Sunni clerics entered the town to try to mediate another ceasefire, said Sheik Raed Hleihel from the Association of Muslim Scholars and a Syrian activist who uses the name Ahmad Alqusair. The two […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Egypt Has Ambitious Plan for Suez Canal Expansion

When the Suez Canal opened in 1869, it had taken hundreds of thousands of Egyptian workers 10 years to complete it. On Tuesday, President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi said he was ready to build another one. At a lavish groundbreaking ceremony that included a military air show and the symbolic detonation of demolition explosives, Mr. Sisi’s government announced an ambitious plan to build a new waterway that would expand the capacity of the existing canal while creating jobs and revenue for the government. Mr. Sisi set an equally ambitious timeline for the project, which would involve the digging or dredging of approximately 45 miles of earth and wetlands, saying the new waterway would open next year. “We are racing time, because we are very late,” he said. There has been talk for years of expanding the development along the canal, a crucial passage for international shipping that links […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Shell Starts Up Oil Production at Bonga North West

Royal Dutch Shell reported Wednesday that its Nigerian subsidiary, Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company, has started up oil production from the first well at the Bonga North West deep-water development off the country’s coast. Shell Upstream International Director Andrew Brown commented in a company statement: "This is an excellent addition to our deep-water portfolio – a key growth theme for Shell’s world-wide upstream business. It’s also good news for Nigeria, as it is a new source of oil revenues and strengthens Nigeria’s deep-water expertise, a key driver of economic development." The original Bonga project began producing oil and gas in 2005. It was Nigeria’s first deep-water development in water depths of more than 3,250 feet. Bonga North West is the next step in the project’s development.  The Bonga project, which began producing oil and gas in 2005, was Nigeria’s first deep-water development in water depths over 1,000 metres. […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple