Aramco to partner on integrated megarefinery in India

Ratnagiri Refinery & Petrochemicals—a consortium of public-sector refining firms Indian Oil Corp., Bharat Petroleum Corp., and Hindustan Petroleum Corp.—has signed a memorandum of understanding with Saudi Aramco to jointly develop and build RRPCL’s previously announced grassroots 60 million-tonne/year integrated refining and petrochemical complex in Maharashtra state on India’s west coast.  Source: News

Barclays: US onshore upstream budgets up 9% in 2018

Preliminary upstream budgets from the top 40 US onshore producers show a 9% rise this year, according to an updated Barclays’ E&P spending survey. This is well below Barclays’ previous estimate of an increase of 21% for North America E&P spending in last December’s survey. Source: News

EIA: Global trade slowdown presents downside risks to oil consumption

Global oil consumption will rise by 1.8 million b/d in both 2018 and 2019, according to the US Energy Information Administration’s latest Short-Term Energy Outlook. And although the forecast was revised higher from EIA’s previous STEO, which pegged a 1.7 million-b/d rise for both 2018 and 2019, a slowdown in global trade could affect oil […]

Maritime oil crime is pervasive, requires more attention, forum told

Stopping crude oil and product thefts may not seem to be a high priority in fighting global maritime crime, but they need to be addressed more aggressively because they can finance narcotic smuggling, human trafficking, and other destructive criminal enterprises, speakers agreed during an Apr. 10 Atlantic Council discussion. Source: News

Germany’s support for Nord Stream 2 wavers

Apparent German support for the controversial Nord Stream 2 pipeline across the Baltic Sea is wavering. Chancellor Angela Merkel said after meeting with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko that the pipeline cannot advance unless Ukraine retains a role as a transit country for Russian natural gas bound for Europe.  Source: News

ConocoPhillips to cut 450 jobs in UK by 2020

A company spokesperson has confirmed that ConocoPhillips is cutting 450 jobs across its UK operations between this October and April 2020. Source: News

IHS Markit: Canada could supply one third of USGC heavy oil market by 2020

Supplies of Canadian oil sands heavy crude are increasingly being refined on the US Gulf Coast (USGC) and could top 1.2 million b/d—a full one third of the region’s heavy oil refining market—by 2020, according to an IHS Markit report. Current runs of Canadian crude in the USGC market are estimated to already be more […]