Energy News

MUMBAI (Reuters) - Energy giant Reliance Industries is close to a nearly $6 billion overseas acquisition and the likely target is the assets of petrochemicals firm LyondellBasell, the Economic Times reported on Monday, citing an unidentified banker.

MOSCOW (AFP) - Russian energy giant Gazprom, the world's largest gas firm, said Monday its net profits plunged 49.8 percent in the first half of 2009 compared to a year earlier due to higher expenses.

HOUSTON (Reuters) - U.S. oil companies were shutting production on Sunday as they evacuated workers from the Gulf of Mexico ahead of Hurricane Ida, which is forecast to roar across the offshore oil patch Monday before making landfall on Tuesday.

TOKYO (AFP) - It may sound like a sci-fi vision, but Japan's space agency is dead serious: by 2030 it wants to collect solar power in space and zap it down to Earth, using laser beams or microwaves.

BALHAF, Yemen (AFP) - Yemen, one of the world's poorest countries, joined the international club of gas exporters Saturday with pumping starting at a newly built liquefied natural gas plant in the Gulf of Aden.

WASHINGTON, Nov 5 (OneWorld.net) - Climate analysts are calling on the Obama administration to use an international finance meeting this week to press for a swift end to subsidies for coal, oil, and natural gas companies around the world.

BAGHDAD (AFP) - Exxon Mobil on Thursday became the first US company to win a contract since Iraq's oil industry was nationalised almost 40 years ago, further expanding the role of foreign nations in the industry.

STOCKHOLM - Sweden and Finland on Thursday approved a Baltic Sea pipeline project that would ship Russian natural gas to Germany, clearing two key obstacles for construction to begin next year.

BAGHDAD - A consortium grouping U.S. and European oil giants Exxon Mobil Corp. and Royal Dutch Shell PLC on Thursday signed a $50 billion deal to develop one of Iraq's most prized oil fields, as the OPEC nation looks to revamp its battered energy sector.

BUSHLAND, Texas - Authorities say three people were injured when a natural gas pipeline explosion shook homes, melted window blinds and shot flames hundreds of feet into the air in northern Texas.

BAGHDAD (AFP) - US major Exxon Mobil has won a contract to develop West Qurna 1 field, the oil ministry said on Thursday, as the foreign role in Iraq's oil industry widens with China leading the way.

BAGHDAD (AFP) - Iraq formally signed a deal with Britain's BP and China's CNPC on Tuesday to almost triple production at a giant southern oilfield.

MUMBAI (Reuters) - The BSE Sensex dropped 3.1 percent on Tuesday, a sixth straight fall that took it to its lowest close in two months, pulled down by a sell-off in energy giant Reliance Industries and weak global markets.

MOSCOW - Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin urged the European Union on Monday to lend Ukraine at least $1 billion to help it pay for natural gas supplies from Russia and avoid another disruption of flows to Europe.

BAGHDAD (AFP) - A consortium led by Italian energy giant ENI has initialled a contract with the Iraqi government to explore the Zubair oilfield in southern Iraq, an oil ministry spokesman said on Monday.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Delays in sealing new orders forced Indian wind power company Suzlon Energy Ltd to cut its sales forecast, but the company will still see full-year profits near last year's level, an executive said on Saturday.

CHICAGO (AFP) - British oil giant BP has been hit with a record US fine of 87.4 million dollars for safety violations at a Texas refinery where 15 people were killed in a 2005 explosion, officials said Friday.

LONDON (AFP) - Energy giant Royal Dutch Shell is in "exclusive" talks to sell three European refineries to Indian conglomerate Essar, a company spokesman told AFP.

KINSHASA (Reuters) - India has offered Democratic Republic of Congo $263 million in loans to build hydroelectric plants and repair battered infrastructure in the war-ravaged central African nation, Congo's foreign minister said on Friday.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Videos posted online by US oil company Chevron purporting to show rampant corruption among Ecuadoran officials are actually a set-up meant to taint an ongoing trial against the energy giant, an attorney in the case alleged.