US Energy Company Raising Money for First US Oil Sands Project

Earth Energy Resources Inc., a Canadian company has been granted a government's approval to launch the very first US oil sands project in a 62 acre pit in Uintah County, Utah.

The project would be able to produce 2,000 barrels of oil a day by extracting oil out of sands using a proprietary solvent. Earth Energy requires $35 million to fund the project.

New Technologies Create Oil Industry Boom in North Dakota

Recent technology advancement in drilling techniques has enable bigger oil wells to be developed with faster drilling and lower costs. Such things have turned North Dakota massive oil reserve to be economically able to be tapped.

The two miles underground Bakken Shale deposit has been known and tapped on occasion for decades. This year however is entirely new since technological improvements made it extremely economically and quickly becoming United State's fastest-growing oil-producing areas.

In 2009 alone the oil production has jumped to 80 million barrels, a figure that will be fast growing in 2010 especially since the Bakken Shale could contain up to 4.3 billion barrels of recoverable oil.

Improving Economy Boosting Oil Demand

The International Energy Agency had revised its forecast for world oil demand on improved Asian economic activity however most likely will still be offset by countries like Russia who are pumping more crude than the added rise in consumption.

The agency which is based in Paris revised the forecast to 83.94 million barrels a day. The world is still having a huge reserve of oil supply with non-Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries producing more supply than previously expected. Russia, the world's biggest oil producer churns out a total of 360,000 barrels a day as new fields being developed in Western Siberia and enhanced oil recovery techniques are used to squeeze out more hydrocarbons from existing fields.

Despite current projection, some analysts think Russia will pump around 9.7-9.8 million barrels a day on average this year rather than 10.07 million barrels a day as expected by the IEA with global crude demand to rise 1.6% next year outpacing non-OPEC supply growth of about 1% in 2010.

Countries like the U.S which is the biggest consumer for oil and energy has 8 days higher average on its inventory which stands at 61.7 days this year. China has indicated a move to follow the same lead.

Dow Chemical & Rohm & Haas Completing Merger Dispute Deal

Dow Chemical Co. (DOW) ccompleted its dispute with Rohm & Haas Co. (ROH), agreeing to pay the $78 a share as originally established. Dow Rohm & Haas struck a $15.3 billion merger deal in July 2008. 

The legal battle started after Rohm & Haas sued Dow in January after the company stalled on the merger which Dow blamed due to the frozen credit markets. Dow, like other companies in the world faced threatening decline in its business due to the global recession. 

Several parties have agreed to help Dow to pay for its purchase of Rohm & Haas including a $3 billion in funding from Berkshire Hathaway and $1 billion from the Kuwait Investment Authority. 

Nitrogen Enriched Gasoline by Shell

Shell has unveiled its new nitrogen-enriched gasolines at Shell stations across the U.S codenamed Nitrogen Enriched Gasolines.

The new gasoline contains a unique cleaning system designed to purge carbon deposits in the engine. The new Nitrogen Enriched cleaning system protects and cleans up carbon deposit build-up on intake valves and fuel injectors.

It is believed that the usage of nitrogen as an active cleaning molecule in the new fuel significantly makes it more stable at higher temperatures in modern, tougher conditioned engines. The nitrogen increases the properties of resisting thermal breakdown better than conventional cleaning additives.

US Fertilzer Expected to Continue on Strong Demand

Despite the recent global economic turmoil, US fertilizer industry is looking bright as corn futures prices for December 2009 delivery indicate that the upcoming seasons should be picking up demand. The corn industry is one of the largest consumer for the fertilizer industry and this will boost demand for as farmers are expected to plant corn instead of soybeans which will boost fertilizer demand.

Analysts are predicting that the fundamentals that's driving fertilizer demand remains strong coming from world growing population in developing nations.

US A Schulman Selling Business Unit

US plastic compounder A Schulman is plannning to either establish a joint-venture or selling its Invision business unit,

Schulman Plastic Company initially marketed Invision to be used in automobile interiors as a substitute to polyvinyl chloride (PVC).
However, US automobile sales is declining forcing the company to sell to non-automobile market as well which is also under hit due to US economy slowdown.

The news receives mix reaction with others claiming the product is well received which could lead to opportunity loss. The Invision business unit reported operating losses of $1.6m this year with $2.2m loss for last year.

Technology to Convert Waste to Fertilizer

Two Illinois companies have been awarded a $1m from United States federal grant to look into ways to produce nitrogen fertilizer from wastes.

US Department of Agriculture (USDA), is funding the research on a process derived from N-Ovation and Fluidic MicroControls, which in theory can derive nitrogen from a gas created by cooking crop residue. The gas comes from cooking farm waste, which then turned into nitric acid by introducing a spark of electricity.

The protoype is already existing and the companies are looking at efficient way and to create a machine that capable of supplying 1000 acre of farm fertilizer. This will revolutionize the way fertilizers are made which currently extensively from petrochemical plants.

New Demand for Methanol: Fuel Cell

Following the US Transportation Department approval to permit in-flight use of methanol-powered fuel cells for laptop computers it is expected that a slight boost will be seen in both methanol and fuel cells.

Passengers will be allowed to use methanol fuel cells in commercial airliner passenger and crew compartments, major manufacturers of portable consumer electronic devices such as in mobile phones, digital cameras, DVD players as well as laptops.

US to Ban Bisphenol-A

US Senator Chuck Schumer is in the midst of proposing a legislation to ban the sale of children’s products and food containers containing bisphenol A due to its linkage in the risk of cancer and developmental defects to high doses of BPA.

BPA is used in the manufacture of polycarbonate (PC) for PC bottles especially for PC baby products. America's biggest retailer, Wal-Mart is fast reacting to the news by phasing out products containing BPA. Others like Playtex Infant Care and Nalgene Outdoor Products are also in the move to phase out products containing the chemical.

Huntsman and Hexion Merger Extended

US producer Hexion Specialty Chemicals which is under way of merging with Huntsman has extended the termination date of the Huntsman merger agreement by 90 days to 4 July 2008. This would give the US regualtors more time to evaluate the proposed merger agreement for the two companies.

Hefty $1.2 Million Environmental Penalty for ConocoPhilips

An environmental penalty of $1.2m constituing civil penalty to resolve environmental violations has been summoned to ConocoPhillips' 146,000 bbl/day Texas refinery in Borger by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) due to violation of effluent limits in its Clean Water Act for over 2,000 occasions between 1999 and 2006.

The discharged water effluent was found to contain selenium and whole effluent toxicity affecting aquatic organisms. ConocoPhillips has managed to run the refinery in compliance with the regulations after the court order which also requires ConocoPhillips to monitor surrounding waters for selenium levels.

Lawsuits Await Oil Majors for Ethanol-Gasoline Damages

In what could be a hard slap for the environment, ExxonMobil, Chevron, BP, Shell, Valero, ConocoPhillips and several other oil majors are facing a lawsuit for the manufacture and sale of ethanol-blended gasoline due to the allegedly blended biofuels damaging marine fuel tanks and engines including polluting the marine environment.

The lawsuits is costing thousands of dollars in repairs of hard items alone. It was understood that the ethanol in gasoline fuel has corrosive properties and dissolved the fibreglass resins used in the fibreglass tanks as well as engines.

Since the banning of methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE) in 2004, Ethanol has been added to regular gasoline to boost octane levels, reduce engine knocking and improve vehicle performance.

So far, Chevron, BP, Shell, Valero and ConocoPhillips are the oil majors facing with the lawsuits with other names like PetroDiamond, Tower Energy and Big West currently on the list as well.

Texas Building Renewable Fuels Complex by Orion

Orion Ethanol is planning to build a renewable fuel complex from corn fructose in Texas. Orion has already secured an idle wet mill in Dimmitt, Texas, which will be integrated into the company's 2million gal/year renewable fuels complex.

The wet mill will be able to produce 60m gal/year ethanol 10m gal/year edible oil for the first stage of the project. Later, Orion Ethanol plans for additional 10m gal/year cellulose-to-ethanol process, a 12m gal/year biodiesel plant, a 25,000 tonne/year yeast plant and a 60-75 megawatt (MW) wind and biomethane power plant.

Brazil Uses More Ethanol than Gasoline

Brazil, the world's largest ethanol producer from sugarcane consumes more ethanol than gasoline at the start of the South American winter as predicted by analysts. Ethanol demand in Brazil is especially high and it exceeded gasoline was in February 2008.

Brazillian ethanol consumption mainly goes to sales of flexible-fuel vehicles, which can burn either ethanol or gasoline which is the normal spec for somewhat 2.75 million automobiles in 2007 alone.

Ethylene Dichloride Released By OxyVinyls

OxyVinyls, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Occidental Chemical has accidentally released more than 750 lbs of ethylene dichloride (EDC). OxyVinyls’ LaPorte plant in Texas with capacity of 1.77m tonnes/year EDC was also found previously releasing 500 lbs of carbon monoxide, 340 lbs of gaseous ethylene and 39 lbs of vinyl chloride monomer (VCM) to atmosphere.

Ethylene, EDC and VCM are feedstocks for production of polyvinyl chloride (PVC). The investigation revealed that two vent gas incinerators were tripped offline causing the release of toxic gas to air.

US Refineries Growth Stagnant

With heavy competitions from the rest of the world, especially from the Middle East, US refineries are facing difficulties for refinery expansion. The current situation in the US doesn't help much either with shortage of skilled labour and regulatory issues.

At the moment, it is very hard to get a permit from the US authorities especially outside the Gulf Coast.

Natural Gas Pipeline Ruptured in Texas

A gathering pipeline servicing natural gas ruptured in South Texas near Mexico, however caused no injuries nor death. The line is operated by Hesco Pipeline of 20 inches in diameter where remaining natural gas has been burned off due to maintenance and repair work.

Cellulosic Ethanol for Biorefineries Hitting US

US is investing $114m for cellulosic ethanol projects to explore cellulosic ethanol feedstock options and production processes for biorefineries. The investment is for four years development of funding of four pilot plants before contribution from private sector. The government funding is seen as part of US goal of making cellulosic ethanol cost-competitive with gasoline by 2012 under the President Bush administration.

The pilot plant will be able to produce about 2.5m gal/year of cellulosic ethanol in a plant to build a commercial ethanol plant with annual output capacity of around 25m gallons or 75,000 tonnes.

There are as yet no commercial-scale cellulosic ethanol production units in the US. Current technologies explored under study for cellulosic ethanol production includes conventional cellulosic conversion technologies, biogenetic and microbiotic conversion of cellulosic feedstock into cost-effective fuels.

Cellulosic Ethanol Production Route from Biomass

Incentives to go with ethanol is pressured under the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 which requires the US to produce at 100m gal/year of cellulosic ethanol by 2010 and 500m gal/year by 2012 in the route to achieve 36bn gal/year of renewable fuels in 2022.

Membrane-cell Chlor Alkali Plant in Texas by Dow

Dow is planning to build a new chlor alkali plant in Freeport, Texas using a membrane cell expected completion in 2011. The unique investment scheme for the chemical plant is utilizing Shintech, a vinyl producer to partly invest in the chemical plant while Dow in return will supply a steady amount of vinyl feedstock vinyl chloride monomer (VCM) from Dow.

During construction, the existing chlor-alkali complex that will be replaced with the membrane cell will result in chlorine and caustic soda production in the US in the amount of 3.6 mil tonnes of chlorine and 4 mil tonnes of caustic soda capacity per year.

The membrane-cell technology is expected to greatly decrease the production cost through efficient energy use replacing the diaphragm-cell production process in currently in Freeport.