Ana Isabel Martinez News

Two workers died and another remained missing after a raging fire broke out early on Friday morning at an offshore platform run by Mexican state oil company Pemex just off the southern edge of the Gulf of Mexico.In posts on Twitter, Pemex said it had accounted for all other workers and said oil production had taken a major hit from the blaze.Video circulating on social media showed the massive platform and its tangle of pipelines engulfed in flames as nearby boats sought to douse the fire with hoses.The platform operates in the company's Cantarell Field…

Five workers were killed and six injured in Sunday's fire on an offshore platform in the southern Gulf of Mexico operated by Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex) that cut about a quarter of Mexico's oil production, the company said on Monday.The fire broke out as crews were performing maintenance on the platform, and a search for missing workers continues, Pemex Chief Executive Octavio Romero told a news conference.The platform remains out of operation, with about 421,000 barrels per day of oil lost and 125 wells offline, he said.

The United States on Tuesday sanctioned a network of oil trading firms, individuals and vessels that have helped Venezuelan state-run oil company PDVSA sell crude mainly to Asia despite Washington's sanctions on the South American nation.The measure targets a network that the U.S. Treasury Department says helped the administration of President Nicolas Maduro, whose 2018 re-election Washington called a sham, broker the sale of hundreds of millions of dollars in Venezuelan oil."Those facilitating the illegitimate Maduro regime's attempts to circumvent United States sanctions contribute to the corruption that consumes Venezuela," Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said in a news release.The Treasury said its Office of Foreign Assets Control…

Tankers carrying nearly two months worth of Venezuelan oil output are stuck at sea as global refiners shun the nation’s crude to avoid falling foul of U.S. sanctions, according to industry sources, PDVSA documents and shipping data.Washington is tightening sanctions to cut Venezuela’s oil exports and deprive the government of socialist President Nicolas Maduro of its main source of revenue.The OPEC member’s exports are hovering near their lowest levels in more than 70 years and the economy has collapsed, but Maduro has held on - to the frustration of the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump.Washington has blacklisted ships and…

Last year, China replaced the United States as the No. 1 importer of oil from Venezuela, yet another front in the heated rivalry between Washington and Beijing.The United States had imposed sanctions on Venezuela’s state-owned oil company as part of a bid to topple that country’s socialist president, Nicolas Maduro. U.S. refineries stopped buying Venezuelan crude. Caracas’ ally China, long a major customer, suddenly found itself the top purchaser. Through the first six months of 2019, it imported an average of 350,000 barrels per day of crude from Venezuela.But in August, Washington tightened its sanctions on Venezuela, warning that any foreign entity that continued to do business with the South American country’s government could find itself subject to sanctions.

The trading arm of Mexican state oil company Pemex is mulling options to slash the number of fuel cargoes the country imports in May and June as demand plummets because of the coronavirus, three sources close to the talks told Reuters.Pemex last week declared force majeure over fuel supplies from its trading arm PMI Comercio Internacional after a bottleneck of more than 60 vessels built up outside Mexican ports, waiting to discharge.But PMI still has not declared force majeure…

Pirates attacked an Italy-flagged offshore supply vessel in the southern Gulf of Mexico, injuring two crew members, the Mexican Navy said on Tuesday, in the latest outbreak of robbery and piracy to hit oil platforms and infrastructure in the area.One of the crew members of the vessel, Remas, received a bullet wound, and the other suffered a concussion, and both were transferred to a nearby hospital, the Navy said in a statement.Owned by Italian offshore contractor Micoperi, Remas…

Mexican state oil firm Pemex has reached a preliminary agreement with a consortium led by Talos Energy to evaluate whether the group's find in the Gulf of Mexico extends into a neighboring Pemex block, the companies said in a statement on Thursday.The deal, which covers territory in the shallow waters of the Gulf of Mexico, is the first of its kind for Pemex and will be in force for two years.The Talos consortium, which includes Britain's Premier Oil and Mexico's Sierra Oil & Gas, won development rights for two blocks during the first oil auction launched by President Enrique Pena Nieto.

Oil service and mapping firms still emerging from an industry recession have received a boost from about $800 million of data sales to energy firms considering bidding for Mexican oil and gas blocks. Mexico will on Wednesday hold its most important auction since a 2013 reform ended the 75-year monopoly on the energy sector held by state-run oil firm Pemex. The government of President Enrique Pena Nieto hopes the deepwater sale will attract tens of billions of dollars of investment to turnaround a slump in the country's oil output. Seven previous auctions drew investment pledges of $61 billion.

Mexico's state-run oil company Pemex will increase crude exports to Japan in the coming months after selling several spot cargoes to customers including Cosmo Oil, JX Holdings and TonenGeneral, according to a company source and Thomson Reuters trade flows data. Pemex typically sends around 1 million barrels per month of Maya crude to Cosmo Oil under a supply agreement, but the company recently negotiated additional deliveries, the source said. The cargoes of Maya and Isthmus crudes will arrive in Japan from May through June after loading at Mexico's Dos Bocas and Salina Cruz terminals, according to Thomson Reuters data. Mexico's crude exports have fallen in recent months amid declining oil output.

Three workers were killed and at least seven injured when a fire broke out on a Pemex oil processing platform in the Gulf of Mexico, but the latest in a string of incidents is now under control, the Mexican oil giant said via Twitter on Sunday. A spokesman for Pemex said oil continued to be pumped but that the company was still evaluating any impact on production. The platform did not have to be evacuated, according to a tweet. The fire occurred on the offshore Abkatun A Permanente processing platform in Mexico's oil-rich Bay of Campeche where a fire claimed seven lives in April last year, causing crude output from four nearby fields to plunge nearly 70 percent.

Twelve Pacific Rim countries on Monday reached the most ambitious trade pact in a generation, aiming to liberalize commerce in 40 percent of the world's economy in a deal that faces skepticism from U.S. lawmakers. The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) pact struck in Atlanta after marathon talks could reshape industries, change the cost of products from cheese to cancer treatments and have repercussions for drug companies and automakers. Tired negotiators worked round the clock over the weekend to settle tough issues such as monopoly rights for new biotech drugs.

Mexican state-owned oil company Pemex is ramping up gasoline imports and boosting domestic production at two major refineries after fuel shortages led to long lines at gas stations in several states this week. Pemex announced an "extraordinary" gasoline import surge of 75,000 barrels per day (bpd) and company data showed that was  on top of gasoline imports that totaled 370,000 bpd in May. Since Monday, the company has not responded to requests for more information. Pemex has blamed the shortage on an increase in illegal taps on gasoline pipelines, a long-standing problem but one that is on pace to set a record this year. Pemex said in a statement on Monday that the number of illegal taps so far this year total 2,813, already two-thirds of the year-end figure last year.

Mexican state-run oil company Pemex said on Wednesday that it was fighting a fire on oil platform in Campeche Bay on the Gulf of Mexico, home to the country's biggest oil field, and that some 300 workers have been evacuated. Pemex said on Twitter that a fire had broken out on the Abkatun Permanente platform overnight and that eight firefighting boats were tackling the blaze. Reporting by Ana Isabel Martinez

Mexico has approved the terms for five shallow water areas containing around 355 million barrels of oil equivalent as part of its Round One tender to open up the country's oil fields, the country's energy regulator said on Friday.   The whole of Round One covers areas including the Chicontepec basin and the Perdido area, as well as shallow and deep waters, and sees investment of up to $50.5 billion between 2015 and 2018, the energy regualtor said in November.     (Reporting by Adriana Barrera, Ana Isabel Martinez, Christine Murray and Joanna Zuckerman Bernstein; Editing by Simon Gardner)

Mexican conglomerate Alfa He is interested in participating in association with the state oil company Pemex Exploration Projects in fields on earth, aunque también hacerlo the rule in shallow waters, dijo el viernes el director de Energía the company, Raul Millares. Pemex announced last week that he will seek partners in three mature onshore fields that together contain 2P reserves (proven and probable) for about 250 million barrels of oil equivalent (MMboe). The state said it will too for extra heavy oil fields in shallow waters Ayatsil-Tekel-Utsil in the southern Gulf of Mexico, with 2P reserves of 747 MMboe. "We have more preference or vocation to be more exploration in land…

Mexican rescue workers were trying to refloat a North Korean vessel stranded in the Gulf of Mexico a few miles from a port where it had planned to load fertilizer, authorities said on Tuesday. The 6,700-metric-ton freighter Mu Du Bong, which had come from Cuba, ran aground on a reef on Monday, 8 miles (13 km) northeast of Tuxpan in Veracruz state, said Ricardo Maza, head of the local emergency services. "The boat is still there. Today we were hoping there would be better surf to be able to refloat it," Maza said. There were no reports of injuries, and the crew was still aboard, he added. Maza said the matter was under the jurisdictions of Tuxpan port authorities, the Mexican Navy and the environmental protection agency due to the possible damage caused to the reef area.