Energy & Oil

• Monday, May 16th 2016 - 18:45 UTC

  Petrobras implosion takes a major player from the floating production systems market

  

  Brazil´s Petrobras problems has taken a major player from the market for new floating production systems in the oil business, according to a report from the industry. In effect absence of new contracts has forced fabricators and equipment suppliers to make huge cutbacks in personnel and spending and the past 12 to 18 months have been a difficult period the whole deepwater production sector.

• Wednesday, May 11th 2016 - 12:14 UTC

  Oil markets on alert: major overhaul in Saudi Arabia´s cabinet and economic policy

  

  Saudi Arabia's King Salman removed the country's veteran oil minister as part of a broad government overhaul. Ali al-Naimi has been replaced after more than 20 years in the role by former health minister Khaled al-Falih.

• Thursday, May 5th 2016 - 11:27 UTC

  Petrobras sells stakes in Argentina and Chile, part of major divestment plan

  

  Brazil’s state-run oil firm Petrobras said it has concluded the sale of its 67.2% stake in Petrobras Argentina to Argentina’s Pampa Energía for US$ 892 million, according to a securities filing. Petrobras also sold all of Petrobras Chile Distribución to Southern Cross Group for about US$ 490 million as part of its divestment program, the company said.

• Wednesday, May 4th 2016 - 08:46 UTC

  Attorney General accuses Lula da Silva of a key role in Petrobras huge corruption scandal

  

  Brazil's Attorney General Rodrigo Janot has asked the Supreme Court to authorize an investigation against former President Lula da Silva for alleged corruption. Janot accused Lula of playing a key role in the huge corruption scandal at the state oil company, Petrobras.

• Monday, May 2nd 2016 - 08:51 UTC

  With a subsidy production scheme, Argentina is back exporting oil, mainly to China

  

  Argentine oil producers are shipping record volumes of crude this month, spurred by a new government subsidy that has also prompted state-owned oil company YPF to return to the export market for the first time in years.

• Monday, May 2nd 2016 - 05:34 UTC

  Venezuela moves local time 30 minutes up, back to normal

  

  Venezuelan government on Sunday moved local time up 30 minutes, to four hours behind UTC, with an eye toward dealing with the emergency caused by the ongoing severe drought. The time change will enter into effect as of this month and brings Venezuela back to the time schedule that prevailed until 2007, when the government shifted the nation's clocks back by half an hour.

• Saturday, April 30th 2016 - 11:45 UTC

  YPF will fight back legal claim seeking US$ 500 million for rescinding contracts

  

  Argentina's state-run energy company YPF said this week it will fight a legal claim seek more than US$500 million in damages for rescinding natural gas export contracts in 2009. “YPF shall use all its legal resources to defend its interests and those of its shareholders,” the company said in a filing with the Buenos Aires Stock Exchange.

• Thursday, April 28th 2016 - 07:34 UTC

  Maduro blames the “crazy right” for riots sparked by daily several/hours blackouts

  

  Venezuelan cities cleaned up from a night of looting and fiery protests on Wednesday as government offices closed their doors for the rest of the week in the face of a worsening energy crisis that is causing daily blackouts. In Caracas, hundreds of angry voters lined up to sign a petition beginning the process of recalling the deeply unpopular President Nicolas Maduro.

• Tuesday, April 26th 2016 - 08:04 UTC

  Falklands renews VMS capability contract for tracking over 150 vessels

  

  Big OceanData has been awarded a contract to provide the Government of the Falkland Islands with its vessel monitoring system (VMS) capability for another five years. For the first time the system will include AIS data, which will be integrated with existing Inmarsat tracking data from the fishing vessels.

• Friday, April 22nd 2016 - 08:07 UTC

  Venezuela imposes daily four/hours blackout to save power; brewery out of barley will stop beer production

  

  Recession-hit Venezuela will turn off the electricity supply in its 10 most populous states for four hours a day for 40 days to deal with a severe power shortage, the government said Thursday.