- Top Stories
- Growing N. American Shale Production Creating Infrastructure-Development Opportunities
- Dominion CEO: No One Fuel Source Can Meet Utility Demand
- Moving the Needle: Firms Rush to Improve Shale-Related Midstream Infrastructure
- Market Report
- IEA: Major Scale-Up in Biofuels Needed to Reduce Transportation Emissions
- ASTM International Issues New Oil, Natural Gas-Processing Guidelines
- UNICA Sees Higher Sugar Cane Production from Brazil’s Mid-South Region
- CIMAC: Beware of Problems with Switch to Low-Sulfur Bunker Fuels
- U.K. Study – Biofuels Cause More Harm Than Good
- U.S. Producers, Manufacturers Differ on LNG-Export Potential
- News from Americas
- TransCanada Pushes Back Keystone XL In-Service Date
- Methanex OKs Second Chile-to-Louisiana Methanol Plant Move
- Savage to Offer Crude-by-Rail Services for Utah Terminals
- Enbridge to Expand Infrastructure at Alberta’s Cheecham Terminal
- Sunoco to Proceed with Mariner South Propane, Butane Pipeline
- News from Middle East / Asia
- ExxonMobil, Qatar Petroleum Plan US$10-Billion LNG Terminal at Sabine Pass
- CB&I to Debut Solid-Acid Alkylation for China Gasoline Refiner
- India’s Jindal Eyes Botswana CTL, Coal Projects - Report
- Felda Global Ventures Acquires Malaysian Biodiesel Plant
- Australia Inks Binding LNG Agreement with BG Group, CNOOC
- Alfa Laval to Equip United Arab Shipping Engines with Waste Heat-Recovery Systems
- China Researcher Invents Diesel-PM Filter Tolerant of High-Sulfur Fuel
- News from Europe / Africa
- Neste Oil to Invest €42 Million in Porvoo Refinery Upgrade
- INEOS, Solvay Join Forces, Combine European PVC Businesses
- UPM Launches Fleet Tests of Tall-Oil Renewable Diesel in Finland
- Wärtsilä Nabs Gen-Set Orders for Finnish Nuclear-Power Plant
- Rosneft, Mitsui Ink MoU to Jointly Develop Petrochemical Project
- Air Liquide, CEA Partner on Biomass-Gasification Scheme
- Atlas Copco Launches ‘100% Diesel-Free’ Electric Underground Mining Trucks, Loaders
- Gazpromneft Taps Foster Wheeler for Euro-5 Fuels Upgrade Project
- Electric Buses Rolling in Netherlands
News from Americas
According to an April 26 Dow Jones report, Calgary, Alberta-based TransCanada Corp. has pushed back the Keystone XL pipeline’s in-service date to the second half of 2015, while the line awaits U.S. regulatory approval.
British Columbia-based Methanex announced April 24 that it will move a second, 1 million-tonne-per-year methanol plant from Chile to Geismar, La.
Salt Lake City-based supply chain management company Savage Services announced April 29 that it’s offering expanded services at its terminals in Salt Lake City and Price, Utah, including crude-by-rail transloading services and associated car storage on a manifest basis.
Calgary, Alberta-based Enbridge, Inc. announced May 7 that it has entered into a terminal-services agreement with ConocoPhillips Canada Resources Corp. and Total E&P Canada Ltd. for a US$300-million expansion of existing infrastructure at Enbridge’s Cheecham terminal to accommodate incremental bitumen production from Surmont’s Phase-2 expansion.
Sunoco Logistics Partners LP has received enough binding commitments to enable its Mariner South pipeline to proceed as planned, the company announced May 6.
News from Middle East / Asia
ExxonMobil and Qatar Petroleum have signed a commercial agreement to build a US$10-billion liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal facility – coined the Golden Pass Terminal – in the U.S. Gulf Coast port of Sabine Pass, Texas, according to a May 10 Dallas Morning News report.
Texas-based CB&I announced April 30 that it won a contract from Shandong Wonfull Petrochemical Group to provide the license and processing engineering design for a first-of-a-kind solid-acid alkylation unit in China.
India-based Jindal Steel & Power Ltd. (JSPL) reportedly aims to get involved in a multi-faceted coal project in Botswana including a coal-to-liquids (CTL) scheme.
Felda Global Ventures Holdings Berhad (FGV), through its subsidiary Felda Global Ventures Downstream Sdn Bhd, announced April 18 it signed an asset purchase agreement with Mission Biotechnologies Sdn Bhd (MBSB) to acquire its assets, including a biodiesel plant situated at Kuantan Port in Malaysia for US$11.5 million.
British multinational BG Group announced May 6 that it has signed agreements with China National Offshore Oil Corp. (CNOOC) in which CNOOC will acquire a greater interest in the first of two production trains of the Queensland Curtis LNG Project (QCLNG) and a greater stake in upstream tenements.
Alfa Laval announced April 19 that it won orders to install its “Aalborg XS-TC7A” waste heat-recovery (WHR) economizers on auxiliary engines onboard the entire fleet of the United Arab Shipping Co., the largest regional container ship operator.
A researcher at Hefei University of Technology (HFUT) is touting the commercial development of a diesel-particulate filter (DPF) that tolerates diesel fuels with relatively high sulfur content – an issue that has stifled broader adoption of DPF’s in much of China.
News from Europe / Africa
Finnish refiner Neste Oil announced April 26 that it plans to invest €42 million (about US$55 million) in improving energy efficiency and operational reliability at its Porvoo, Finland refinery.
INEOS and Solvay have agreed to combine their chlorvinyls businesses into a 50-50 joint venture (JV) – effectively becoming one of the largest polyvinyl chloride (PVC) producers in the world, the companies announced May 7.
Finland-based pulp and paper producer UPM announced April 26 that it’s launching real-world fleet-vehicle tests of its “BioVerno” all-hydrocarbon renewable diesel fuel made from tall oil (a pine-tree byproduct).
Wärtsilä announced May 3 that it won a contract to supply emergency diesel generators for the Olkiluoto nuclear-power plant in Finland.
Rosneft announced April 29 that it and Mitsui signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to jointly develop a petrochemical complex project, which will be developed by Rosneft subsidiary Far East Petrochemical Co. (FEPCO).
Air Liquide announced April 19 that it signed a partnership deal with the French government’s atomic energy commission (CEA) on a scheme involving biomass gasification.
Sweden-based Atlas Copco announced April 25 the launch of a range of mainly electric-powered underground mining trucks and loaders, touting “100% diesel-emissions-free operation.”
Foster Wheeler announced May 7 that it won a front-end engineering and design (FEED) contract from Gazproneft for a combined oil refinery unit (CORU) project at the Moscow refinery in Russia.
China-based electric-vehicle maker BYD announced April 25 that six of its electric buses are now in service in the island city of Schiermonnikoog and in the province of Friesland, Netherlands.
A rapid run-up in unconventional crude production and existing infrastructure that is highly underdeveloped is creating countless opportunities for energy infrastructure firms to probe North America’s transportation grid.
Ten years ago, the U.S. energy industry was finalizing plans to import around US$100 billion worth of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to make up for the rapid decline in domestic natural gas production.
Tulsa, Okla. – Infrastructure continues to improve in the Mississippi Lime formation with numerous expansion projects in progress throughout the play in western Oklahoma, north-central Oklahoma and south-central Kansas.
The International Energy Agency’s (IEA) annual progress report Tracking Clean Energy Progress – released April 17 to the Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM) in New Delhi – highlighted the rapid expansion of renewable technologies as “one of the few bright spots in an otherwise bleak assessment of global progress towards low-carbon energy,” according to the IEA in a statement.
ASTM International has released a new publication – Manual 58, Petroleum Refining and Natural Gas Process – aimed at providing the latest industry and research advances in petroleum refining, natural gas processing and refinery management.
The Industry Union Cane Sugar Association (UNICA), in conjunction with the Center for Sugar Cane Technology (CTC), projects a grinding of 589.6 million metric tons of sugar cane for the 2013/2014 crop year in Brazil’s Mid-South region – up 10.67% versus 532.76 million metric tons processed in the previous harvest.
CIMAC – the international council on combustion engines – this month issued a new “Guideline for the Operation of Marine Engines on Low Sulfur Diesel,” which includes warnings for ship operators on switching from conventional heavy fuel oil to low-sulfur marine gasoil or marine diesel oil.
A new study by U.K.-based Chatham House researcher Rob Bailey finds that biofuels mandates in the U.K. and Europe only cause more harm than good.
In the past two years, liquefied natural gas (LNG) has become a hot topic in the natural gas industry as producers have sought access to premium markets outside of North American shores.