The offshore Maui field is back to full production.
Staying with Maui, while there was plenty of drama offshore, the NZ energy industry was shocked again with Methanex starting legal proceedings against independent consultants, Netherland Sewell & Associates, over the methodology used in their final determination on Maui reserves. Other defendants named in the action include the NZ Government, Maui partners Shell NZ, Todd Energy and OMV, together with Contact Energy and NGC.
With NZ still shocked by the Maui redetermination report and subsequent legal action, the industry got some good news in the way of the Tui-1 oil well discovery. NZOG boss Eric Mathews said while Tui-1 looked like a "marginal" discovery, if successful subsequent appraisal drilling proved up possible reserves figures, then the field should definitely prove commercial.
Aiming to win over a sceptical public, politicians and environmentalists, ChevronTexaco and partners have kindly asked the public to comment on its latest proposal to commercialise the Gorgon Gasfield off the WA coast.
No doubt the Gallop Government would welcome another multi-billion LNG project up North, however the tricky question of Barrow Island, a class A nature reserve remains. The partners argue that without Barrow Island, commercialising Gorgon will cost an extra $1 billion and become unviable.
While the math is simple, the politics is complex. WA's Upper House is controlled by the Greens, who remain to be convinced of the need to develop Gorgon. At federal level, with the debate on energy reform heating up, Gorgon gas could become an important contributor to the nation's energy mix.
On the other side of the world, BHP Billiton's high margin oil strategy got a big boost this week after an appraisal struck hydrocarbons in a previously undrilled area of the Atlantis field in the Gulf of Mexico. BHPB said the positive drilling result will see a upward revision of the current reserve estimate of 635 million of barrels of oil equivalent.
At the same time, BHPB said it would commit a further $US745 million to commercialise the field, the third biggest yet discovered in the Gulf of Mexico. The total amount thus far committed to the field now stands at $US1.1 billion.
Hoping for a better result than the one they got at Twin Lions, partners in the Cliff Head Joint Venture have started drilling Mentelle-1, a wildcat targeting a prospect northeast of the northern boundary of the Cliff Head Oil Field. The results should be known in about a week. The JV have also agreed to at least one additional well following Mentelle-1.
It was an interesting week for oil giant BP with the company announcing a huge Russian deal while squashing reports its Tangguh gas project in Indonesia is being delayed. In Russia, BP will pool its energy assets with a private company to create that nation's third biggest oil and gas producer. The deal is a major vote of confidence for the Russian oil and gas industry and the nation itself.
As for Tangguh, a Hong Kong-based BP spokesman told EnergyReview.net that reports Tangguh is being delayed due to poor financial forecasts are both "misleading" and "erroneous". BP is aiming for a 2007 start up for the project.
Finally, the crude oil price is now above the $US35 a barrel mark as Iraq rejected a plan for UN peacekeepers in Iraq and the destruction of Iraqi capacity to build weapons of mass destruction. Earlier in the week, reports emerged in the American press that Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein was moving large amounts of explosives to the country's oil fields in apparent preparation to destroy them in the case of a US-led invasion.
