
By Nick Cunningham of Oilprice.com – Holding some of the largest shale oil and gas reserves in the world, Argentina is often cited as the likely candidate for the next big shale boom, and Vaca Muerta is often described as having the potential to be South America’s Permian basin.

Chesapeake Energy Corp filed for Chapter 11 on Sunday, becoming the largest US oil and gas producer to seek bankruptcy protection in recent years as it bowed to heavy debts and the impact of the coronavirus outbreak on energy markets.

The attorney general for the District of Columbia on Thursday filed a lawsuit against Exxon Mobil, BP, Chevron and Royal Dutch Shell for systematically and intentionally misleading consumers about the role their products play in causing climate change, the latest action by a US attorney general against the oil and gas industry.

The Mexican government’s financial crime department has frozen the bank accounts of companies and people blacklisted by the United States under accusations of having evaded the sanction regime imposed on Venezuela, its chief said on Friday.

The United States blacklisted Mexican company Libre Abordo and a related firm, accusing them of helping Caracas evade US sanctions in the first formal action taken by the US Treasury Department against Mexican companies involved in trading Venezuelan oil.

The Vatican urged Catholics on Thursday to disinvest from the armaments and fossil fuel industries and to closely monitor companies in sectors such as mining to check if they are damaging the environment.

Rapidan Energy Group predicts sweeping changes for the energy sector if former Vice President Joe Biden beats US President Donald Trump in November. Biden's policies would have global implications for energy trade, altering US/China relations, the pace of Iran's oil recovery, trans-Atlantic climate action and other factors.

Brazil's National Petroleum Agency, ANP, temporarily reduced the volume of biodiesel blended with diesel sold at the pump to 10% from 12% for the next five days in an emergency move, the country's lead regulator for the oil and natural gas industry said Tuesday.

Investment flows to Latin America are expected to halve in 2020 from the US$ 164 billion received last year, according to UNCTAD's World Investment Report 2020.

Colombia’s majority state-owned oil company Ecopetrol denounced on Sunday the sabotage of 31 wells at an oil field in the northeast of the country, which put the wells offline and led to oil being spilled.