Little Oil News

OPEC member Venezuela has raised the prospect of declaring force majeure on contracts with major crude buyers amid plummeting output from its oil fields and tanker bottlenecks at ports, according to three sources familiar with the matter.Falling production from Venezuela has contributed to a rally in global oil prices to a near four-year high, and other OPEC members may boost output at a meeting later this month to compensate for the shortfall and other risks to global supplies.Oil is the financial lifeline for the embattled socialist government of President Nicolas Maduro…

Oil investors are finally buying into the notion that the biggest risk to the price now is likely to be supply falling short of demand, rather than from any stubborn overhang of unwanted crude, the options market shows. The price of Brent crude has hit $52 a barrel, virtually double January's near-13-year lows, driven primarily by a decline in global production that has been speedy enough to bring supply and demand into line faster than many had anticipated. "In the end, you will see global oversupply, at some point diminish, and in effect even earlier than speculators realise," ABN Amro chief energy strategist Hans van Cleef said. In the last year, nearly a million barrels per day (bpd) have vanished from higher-cost U.S.

Scottish nationalists are betting $2.5 trillion of hydrocarbons trapped miles beneath the North Sea could bankroll an independent Scotland, but winning control of the European Union's largest oil reserves would be no blank cheque. Scotland says the bulk of Britain's North Sea oil and gas reserves are in its waters, while London says any division would be subject to negotiations should Scots vote to end their 307-year-old union with England in a referendum on Sept. 18. Oil is the punch in Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond's pitch for independence: he accuses London of squandering the North Sea's mineral wealth and says Scotland would be one of the world's richest countries if it took control of its own destiny.

IHC Sealing Solutions, part of IHC Merwede, will launch the zero-pollution SUPREME Athmos seal at the Europort exhibition in Rotterdam, November 5-8. According to the manufacturer, the SUPREME Athmos seal enables ships – with limited draught up to approximately five meters – to prevent oil from being emitted into the environment. A system has been developed to provide a safe and sustainable operation by capturing every possible drop of oil. Water is prevented from entering the system by collecting any leakages from the seal into a drain tank.

As oil from BP's sub-sea well laps coastal Louisiana, most ships in the Gulf have avoided contact with the spill but owners fear that regulations will be tightened after the disaster, raising their costs. “We've seen no delays from the spill, and it hasn't affected the operations of any of our ships,” said Dean Taylor, president of Tidewater Inc. in late May. Four vessels owned by Tidewater, which is headquartered in New Orleans, have been involved in recovery efforts. The company's work boat Damon B.

Divers have plugged most of the leaks in a tanker carrying heavy fuel which sank off the United Arab Emirates, the UAE coastguard reported. A little oil was reported to be still leaking from the Honduras-flagged Al Jazya 1 from holes which divers were trying to plug. Operations to pump the oil from the UAE-owned vessel were hampered because it had no suitable connection to pipe the oil directly to nearby ships, he said.

Divers have plugged most of the leaks in a tanker carrying heavy fuel, which sank off the United Arab Emirates, the UAE coastguard said. Hassan Malallah said a little oil was still leaking from the Honduras-flagged Al Jazya 1 from holes which divers were trying to plug. Operations to pump the oil from the UAE-owned vessel, which sank last Monday, were hampered because it had no suitable connection to pipe the oil directly to nearby ships, he said. Officials have said about 300 tons of oil has leaked from the 260-ft. ship which sank in shallow water in a shipping lane a few miles off Abu Dhabi.