Facing lingering steel shortage, Pakistan is looking for raw material imports from neighboring India and Iran. Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM) has sought permission from the federal ministry of industries for procuring raw material and other items directly from Iran and India to avoid delays in securing prompt supplies. The shortage of raw material has already compelled the PS to operate at 35-40 per cent capacity against the 80-90 per cent in normal days. PS wanted direct purchase of iron ore from Iran and India instead of going through tender process, which takes two months for arrival of raw m...

Gosh, what a difference a recession makes. It’s been less than 19 months since oil rocketed to an all-time high above $147 US a barrel amid fears that it might soon be all gone. But Wednesday, economist Dina Cover at the TD Bank declared that the world’s oil market faces “a massive glut.” She’s not alone. Cambridge Energy Research Associates, a consulting firm, predicts that petroleum demand in the world’s rich industrial nations probably won’t ever rebound as high as its 2005 peak. Total demand will grow, but only because there’s still rising ...

The Shtokman Development AG consortium announced on February 5 that it will delay the startup of the Arctic gas project. Natural gas will begin flowing to Europe in 2016. Liquefied natural gas (LNG) will start in 2017. It a delay of about 3 years. A final pipeline decision will be made in March of 2011 and an LNG plant decision by the end of that year. Total and Statoil are part of the consortium. Experts have questioned Gazprom’s financial and technical ability to complete the project. Analysis Shtokman was discovered in 1988 but delineation drilling only began during 1990-95. Five w...

BP Plc is likely to look at oil and gas fields when considering acquisitions rather than rival companies, Chief Financial Officer Byron Grote said. “If you look at the asset acquisitions that we’ve made in recent times they’ve tended to reinforce gaps that we had in our upstream portfolio, and I want to underscore assets, not companies,” Grote said in an interview in Oslo yesterday. “We have the balance sheet capability to make inorganic moves if we see fit.” BP is already the biggest oil and gas producer in the U.S. Chief Executive Officer Tony Hayward sa...

Saudi Aramco and Royal Dutch Shell are postponing their hydrotreating unit that produces ultra-low sulphur diesel from their joint-venture refinery for the third time to March or April, due to teething problems, sources said yesterday. The new unit, also known as a hydro-desulphuriser, which removes sulphur from diesel, was scheduled to come online before the end of last month, after two planned start-ups at the end of 2009 and in October failed to materialise. It is expected to produce 90,000 barrels per day of 10ppm (parts per million) sulphur diesel, making it the kingdom’s first pr...

Commercial production of oil from the newly discovered Al Jalila offshore oilfield could begin next year, the Media Office of the Dubai Government said yesterday. The new oilfield, named after the daughter of His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, will be the fifth field in production in Dubai since oil was discovered in the 1960s. Research and initial exploration in the new oilfield off the coast of Dubai showed the possibility of full-scale commercial production within a year, said the statement from the Media Of...

Eni SpA has pulled out of its planned $1.5 billion purchase of Heritage Oil Plc’s Ugandan assets in what is a setback for the Italian oil group’s ambitions to grow in Africa to boost flagging output. “Eni today revoked the sale and purchase agreement signed on December 18 for the acquisition of Heritage’s 50 percent share in Ugandan Blocks 1 and 3A, on which Tullow Oil has exercised its preemption right,” an Eni spokesman said on Friday. Earlier four sources familiar with the situation told Reuters that Eni had withdrawn from the planned deal. They said Eni can ...

Volatility in the NYMEX front month crude oil contract has dropped to the lowest for more than two years, and some of the lowest levels at any time since 1996. The market’s remarkable stability appears to be the product of a number of factors. Spot market trading has been confined in a relatively narrow $65-85 per barrel range since Aug 2009, with news flow causing only small day-to-day disturbances. The market seems comfortable trading around $75. It is an equilibrium that satisfies most producers and consumers – high enough to incentivise new investment in fossil fuels and clean...

Crude oil may fall next week as U.S. inventories climb and fuel demand lags behind year-earlier levels, a Bloomberg News survey showed. Seventeen of 43 analysts surveyed, or 40 percent, said oil will drop through Feb. 12. Fourteen respondents, or 33 percent, forecast an increase and 12 said prices will be little changed. Last week, 47 percent of analysts forecast a fall in futures. U.S. supplies of crude oil rose 2.32 million barrels to 329 million last week, an Energy Department report on Feb. 3 showed. Refineries operated at 77.7 percent of capacity, the lowest rate since at least 1989, ex...

The Kirit Parikh Committee is the third such committee to suggest decontrolling petroleum product prices. Probably politicians will again refuse to do so, and instead decree a modest increase in petrol and diesel prices. Yet the key issue is not whether petrol and diesel prices should reflect today’s oil price of $75/barrel. It is that booming Asia will in a decade push oil to $200/barrel and maybe $300/barrel. India must prepare for a world of scarce, expensive oil instead of pretending that astronomical subsidies can ensure price stability. Today, the “under-recoveries”, ...

Danish financial house Danske Market Equities is forecasting the parent company of ocean carrier Maersk Line will return to profitability in 2010 due largely to better container shipping freight rates. DME is forecasting all-in freight rates will increase 16 percent in 2010, and is projecting net profit of $172 million for the A.P. Moller - Maersk Group on the conservative side. The analyst’s bull scenario sees Maersk earning more than $800 million during the year. The report, released Jan. 28, said container shipping on the transpacific and Asia/Europe lanes has turned a corner, with ...

The House Representatives is following very closely the developments of the imminent approval by the European Union of the new ‘Cyprus Shipping Taxation System’ reform package. The new taxation package will help to upgrade and maintain the existing tax legislation, to help Cyprus develop into an even bigger shipping centre internationally and upgrade even more the quality of its merchant fleet, House President Marios Garoyian said in his address to the annual dinner of by the Cyprus Shipping Chamber. Garoyian noted that Cyprus will be able to offer a very competitive operational ...

Driving down South Carolina’s interstates, you might think this is the warehouse capital of the world. Ain’t so. Fact is, South Carolina is losing badly the race with Georgia in attracting large, import-based distribution centers, such as Home Depot and Walmart. As a result, traffic at the port of Charleston plummeted 37 percent from 2004 to 2009, dropping it to ninth in the nation from fourth. During the same time, shipping at the port of Savannah rose 42 percent, increasing its rank in the nation from fifth to fourth. Charleston’s slip means that, despite its prime locat...

Freight volumes through the port of Arkhangelsk decreased by 17.3% in January 2010 compared with the same period of previous year, to 193.4 thousand tons, “PortNews” IAA reports citing the Port Authority. A larger 63.4 percent drop in coastal traffics volumes added to the overall decline. Volumes of crude oil shipments fell 7 times down over the same period of 2009, to 17.2 thousand tons. At the same time, the exports volume was as much as 2.8 times, to 86.7 thousand tons and inbound commodities, largely general cargoes rose 20.1% to 46.7 thousand tons. The outbound volumes inclu...

The new marine port Shanna in Oman was officially opened at the weekend, the Oman News Agency (ONA) has reported. The RO.9.7 million ($25.19m) was opened by the Transport and Communications Ministry at an official ceremony on Saturday. Said bin Hamdoon Al Harthy, undersecretary of the Transport and Communications Ministry for Ports and Marine Affairs told the ONA the project includes a 1,170 metre long dock, 370 metre long wave break waters, a 318 metre long marine dock and offices, shops, a mosque and car parks. Last month, Oman’s gross domestic product (GDP) at current prices decline...

Several construction projects at Port of Vancouver offer the promise of future economic growth, Port executive director Larry Paulson said. “It is currently a beehive of construction activity,” Paulson said in a speech at the annual State of the Port Address at the Red Lion Hotel Vancouver at the Quay. More than 100 construction workers are building a rail project at the Port’s new Terminal 5 and another 10 to 15 workers are installing fencing and utilities, Paulson said. Another 15 to 20 workers are taking apart buildings on the former Rufener Farm, a likely site for futur...

Clearing and forwarding agents have commended the steps taken by the government to address container dwell time at the Dar es Salaam port. Tanzania Freight Forwarders Association (TAFFA) president Otieno Igogo said recently that a stakeholders committee had agreed to speed up the auctioning of containers exceeding 21 days as a way of decongesting the port, adding that the Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA) had co-operated by conducting periodic public auctions of overstayed containers. “TRA conducted 73 auctions at different stations within and outside the port from January to December 2...

Freight traffics via Odessa Commercial Sea Port (OCSP, Ukraine) according to provisional data posted by the port authorities for January 2010, declined by 4.9% compared with that of 2009, to 2.14 million tons. According to the statement referring to Nicholas Pavliuk, the Chief Executive of the state-run company, despite a slight decrease in the total turnover in January 2010 the port showed a 27 percent growth in volumes of containers over the same period in 2009.? State-run Odessa Commercial Sea Port is one of the largest ports of the Black Sea-Azov basin. The port’s facilities allow ...

SKS Logistics will start work on its independent container freight stations (CFS) next fiscal, the company’s top official said. “While we have been concentrating of our ship repair yard, we have drawn the blue prints for our CFS in Raigad, which is close to the JNPT dock area,” chairman and managing director Sarvesh Shahi said on the sidelines of a CII conference. Shahi also said SKS has over 40 acres of land available, and the CFS will use a part of the same. “We will build this station over 3-5 acres of land,” he said. He said SKS always had plans to build th...

China will increase its imports of liquefied natural gas to relieve the current gas shortage, Xinhua news agency reported Sunday, citing Zhang Guobao, head of the National Energy Administration. Large parts of China are suffering shortages of coal, gas and electricity due to an usually cold winter. In early January, the country stepped up rationing of electricity and natural gas, and on Jan. 15 vice-premier Li Keqiang called on domestic coal and gas producers to increase output and for higher coal and gas imports. China will also build more LNG terminals, pipelines and storage facilities in ...