Sonagas Partnering with Eon Ruhrgas

Sonagas, Equatorial Guinea's state gas company is in negotiations to partner with Eon Ruhrgas, the German utility for a second LNG export facility in Equatorial Guinea project creating a West African gas hub. It is likely that a consortium will be set-up comprising of Sonagas, Eon, Union Fenosa of Spain and Portugal's Galp Energia.

Taking advantage of West Africa as a potential route to Europe and amidst instability dependence on Russia gas, the project is expected to get a strong push factor. It is likely that the source gas will be  from gas currently flared as waste by ExxonMobil at the Zafiro deepwater oilfield. 

The consortium is however exposed to a major risk as Equatorial Guinea is one of Africa's most volatile country due to local uprising.

Huge offshore oil discoveries have boosted Equatorial Guinea's oil production from almost nothing a decade ago to about 380,000 b/d, ranking it behind only Nigeria and Angola among sub-Saharan African producers.

Fierce Competition in Australia's LNG Business

Royal Dutch Shell PLC has been reportedly joined the bandwagon as the latest big prospector in Australia's coal seam gas rush. This comes after news that Shell is planning to build a multibillion dollar gas export facility at Gladstone in Queensland state.

It has been a competition of media coverage alongside with BG, ConocoPhillips and Malaysia's Petronas planning to team up with local companies to convert Australia's rich CSG reserves to liquefied natural gas for export.

As to date, five LNG plants are planned to be constructed. Heavy participations comes from all corners including Liquefied Natural Gas Ltd, a smaller scale company compared to the oil giants.

Shell has already signed an exclusive right to investigate a site on Curtis Island near Gladstone for a possible LNG plant with Gladstone Port Corp and has already commenced a feasibility study.

Analysts are not ruling out that there perhaps will be hitting back at Shell by making an even higher bid for Pure Energy from BG.

Malaysian Biodiesel Sold Out

Mission New-Energy, an Australian firm  which has a stake of 100 kmta of biodiesel plant at Malaysian port of Kuantan told the press that all of the potential production is already sold out in 2009. Mission is now on its way for a second palnt which will be able to produce an extra of 250 kmta of biodiesel.

The second plant project has been delayed in construction for many months due to technology switching. Despite the global economic turmoil, Mission Energy has able to sell all of 2009 contractual production to a major global oil and biofuels player for a cost-plus-margin basis protecting it from the volatility in commodities markets.

The recent huge price drop in biodiesel last year had pushed many biodiesel producers to the brink of collapse.

LDPE Production in Halt for LyondellBasell UK France

LyondellBasell is reportingly will be idling its production of low density polyethylene (LDPE) units at France and UK. The Carrington unit in the UK has a nameplate capacity of 185,000 tonnes/year, and France's Fos plant has a nameplate capacity of 110,000 tonnes/year of LDPE.

The news comes in the midsts of demand for polyethylene has significantly improved compared to the fourth quarter of 2008 however the idling is due to demand still not within normal patterns especially in Europe. 

Analysts believe that the production cut is more due to extremely steep ethylene contract prices in the market which is the major feedstock for LDPE production.

India Building It's First Biodiesel Plant

Mission Biofuels, a Mumbai-based biodiesel company is planning to build the India's first biodiesel plant in the eastern Indian state of Orissa with a capacity of 100,000 mt/year plant. The construction cost for the biodiesel plant is expected to be around $USD 75million which does not include the company's already access to 350,000 acres of jatropa farms across the country.

The construction will take two years to coincide with the maturity of its jatropha crops which are 40% planted in Orissa. Jathropa crops have made its way as a sustainable source for biodiesel fuels in the debate of carbon balance.

Petronas Looking for Concession Extension in Mozambique

A Malaysian state oil company, PETROLIAM Nasional Bhd or widely known as Petronas has asked for an extension to its exploration licence in the Zambezi River delta in Mozambique in a request to the National Petroleum Institute.

The claim for the extension is to allow Petronas to do further investigations after an initial study of exploration activities. It was rumoured that evidents of extraction opportunities have been found in the area.