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Federal and state regulators have cleared the way for Formosa Plastics Corp. to begin construction on a $2 billion expansion of its petrochemical complex in Point Comfort. The approvals come two years after the private U.S. affiliate of the Taiwan-based industrial company announced plans to build new units and expand its capacity on 372 acres within its existing 1,600-acre site 120 miles southwest of Houston near Port Lavaca. It’s the fourth expansion since the Point Comfort plant went online in 1983. The Environmental Protection Agency issued final greenhouse gas permits and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality greenlighted the environmental...

Full Title: Dominion, Duke Energy, Piedmont Natural Gas and AGL Resources Form Joint Venture to Own Proposed Atlantic Coast Pipeline - $4.5 billion-$5 billion pipeline would bring 1.5 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day to North Carolina and Virginia - 'Transformational' project provides growing Mid-Atlantic markets a new route for access to competitive, domestic energy supplies - Investment would create thousands of jobs, promote economic development and cleaner air, increase state and local tax revenue - Pipeline expected to be in service by late 2018, pending regulatory approvals Four major U.S. energy companies – Dominion (NYSE: D), Duke...

The impact of higher oil and gas activity, fueled by a run-up in crude prices, continued to flow into the general economies of Midland and Odessa in July. Karr Ingham, the Amarillo economist who prepares the Midland-Odessa Regional Economic Index for Midland Development Corp. and Security Bank, said the July index is 6.2 percent higher than the previous July. This is a higher increase than June, which was 5.8 percent above June 2013 levels. Ingham said the increased momentum comes at a time when the Midland-Odessa economy had been reporting shrinking growth rates. “It’s not like we were really seeing...

The Iraqi oil ministry said on Thursday it would challenge a U.S. court decision that stopped U.S. Marshals from seizing some one million barrels of disputed Kurdish oil docked near Texas. On Monday, a U.S. district court ruled in favour of a request by Iraq's Kurdish region that a demand by the Iraqi government for U.S. authorities to seize the Kurdish oil shipment be scrapped. However, the court gave Baghdad 10 days to resubmit its case. "The ministry of oil is emphasising that it is preparing the amended request and will forward it in the required period," the oil ministry...

The federal government will resume oil and gas leasing in California following a report released Thursday that found little scientific evidence that fracking and similar extraction techniques are dangerous. The Bureau of Land Management said the report — and additional environmental reviews — will allow it to begin leasing on public land next year. The announcement is welcome news for energy companies that have been shut out of the oil-rich San Joaquin Valley and Central Coast. But critics, including environmental organizations whose lawsuits led to a judge's order to halt leasing last year, said the analysis was rushed by the...

Morgan Stanley has quietly filed plans to build and run one of the first U.S. compressed natural gas export facilities, the first sign the bank is plunging back into physical commodity markets even as it sells its physical oil business. In a 23-page application to the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Fossil Energy submitted in May, the Wall Street bank outlined a proposal to build, own and operate a compression and container loading facility near Freeport, Texas, which will have capacity to ship 60 billion cubic feet a year of compressed natural gas (CNG). While the size of the...

China's energy heavyweights Sinopec Corp and PetroChina have upgraded their outlook on the country's shale gas industry, citing steadily declining costs, but stopped short of predicting a near-term boom. China, estimated to hold the world's largest technically recoverable shale resources, is hoping to replicate the shale boom that has transformed the energy landscape of the United States. Industry experts caution that it would be much more difficult for China to monetise its shale gas reserves than the U.S. as it faces serious challenges from water shortages to complicated geological structure and a lack of infrastructure. But top executives at China's...

Growing global demand is pushing a flurry of new construction, especially on the Texas Gulf Coast, of units for direct manufacture of propylene — a key chemical building block historically derived as a byproduct of other processes . In North America, propylene primarily has come from petrochemical plants using petroleum-derived naphtha as a feedstock. But that’s changing as the plants switch to ethane, a natural gas liquid that is now abundant and cheap because of the nation’s surging natural gas production. The ethane feedstock, however, produces little propylene. Propylene supplies have declined, contributing to occasional shortages, according to Enterprise Products...

Valero Energy Corp. has restarted production at a corn ethanol plant in Indiana that was shuttered more than two years ago by its previous owner. San Antonio-based Valero bought the plant in March from Illinois-based Aventine Renewable Energy Holdings Inc. for $34 million, boosting the number of its ethanol plants to 11. Valero has been preparing the plant for a restart since its purchase. Because the plant has been shuttered for almost two years, “it took a lot of preparation and maintenance,” Valero spokesman Bill Day said, but the company didn’t have to add any new equipment. During the time...

The independent companies at the forefront of the U.S. shale boom will finally earn enough from selling oil and gas to cover their capital expenditures next year, for the first time since 2008. Free cash flow, which measures operating cash flow minus capital spending, for the 25 leading independent oil and gas producers is expected to show a surplus of $2.4 billion in 2015, according to a consensus forecast in the Financial Times. That compares with a shortfall of around $9 billion in 2013 and $32 billion in 2012. ("Shale oil and gas producers' finances lift growth hopes" FT, Aug...

The amount of crude oil and refined petroleum products moved by U.S. railroads increased 9% during the first seven months of this year compared with the same period in 2013. In July, monthly average carloadings of oil and petroleum products were near 16,000 carloads per week, according to the Association of American Railroads (AAR). The increase in oil volumes transported by rail reflects rising U.S. crude oil production, which reached an estimated 8.5 million barrels per day in June for the first time since July 1986. AAR estimates that more than half of the nearly 460,000 carloads tracked in its...

Wintershall's head of exploration and production warned Thursday that Germany's 'Energiewende' (or Energy Transition) dream of pursuing an economy powered by the wind and the sun is in danger of turning into a nightmare. Speaking to energy journalists at the ONS exhibition in Stavanger, Norway, Wintershall Executive Director Martin Bachmann said he was concerned about figures recently published by Statistics Norway that showed overall investment in Norway's petroleum sector will drop by EUR 6 billion ($7.9 billion) next year. "That is actually bad news for Europe's security of supply and I think Germany – as the biggest market in Europe...

An explosion shook BP’s biggest U.S. refinery late Wednesday in Whiting, Indiana, but appears to have left no serious injuries after a fire was extinguished. A spokesman for the Whiting Fire Department said Thursday a compressor at the refinery exploded, causing a blast that was felt at the station one-half mile away from the refinery. It caused a fire at the facility, but no injuries were reported, he said. One worker was taken to the hospital as a precaution, but was later released, BP spokesman Scott Dean said in an emailed statement. The London oil company said the fire was...

Royal Dutch Shell said it had reached deals on some of the four Nigerian oil fields it has offered for sale as the oil major pushes ahead with divesting global assets to cut costs. Shell last year put up for sale its 30 percent shares in four oil blocks in the Niger Delta - Oil Mining Licences... - as well as a major pipeline, the Nembe Creek Trunk Line. "We have signed sales and purchase agreements for some of the oil mining leases, but not all that we are seeking to divest," a Shell spokesman said on Wednesday. In several...

If you’re stuck at a railroad crossing or trapped on a delayed Amtrak train, you might blame it on the US oil boom. US oil production is the highest in decades, and more and more crude is traveling by train. That is slowing shipments of grains, gravel, and even coal, as commodities and a resurgent oil industry compete for a finite amount of US rail. More oil pipelines could help ease the freight bottleneck, but those take time to build and have become controversial topics in the debate over the future of US energy. In the meantime, firms are taking...

Record-setting liquid fuels production growth in the United States has more than offset the rise in unplanned global supply disruptions over the past few years, although differences in quality and location suggest that the substitution may not be exactly 1-for-1. U.S. liquid fuels production, which includes crude oil, hydrocarbon gas liquids, biofuels, and refinery processing gain, grew by more than 4.0 million barrels per day (bbl/d) from January 2011 to July 2014, of which 3.0 million bbl/d was crude oil production growth. During that same period, global unplanned supply disruptions grew by 2.8 million bbl/d. U.S. production growth, the main...

Drivers hitting the roads during the upcoming holiday weekend will likely encounter good news: the cheapest Labor Day weekend gasoline prices since 2010. The forecast comes amid falling domestic and global crude prices, analysts at GasBuddy said. The benchmark price for U.S. crude is down nearly $9 per barrel since the Memorial Day weekend, and the the international price is down $7 in the same period. A downward trend in gasoline prices began in July and will likely continue through autumn, the gasoline price monitors said. Interestingly, the downward trend in crude comes despite several global conflicts in and around...

No government has supported Hamas throughout its war with Israel more stridently than Qatar, hosting its leaders, funding its militarization, and, in recent weeks, blocking cease-fire efforts on Gaza brokered by Egypt and supported by the US. That might cause a modest rift between Washington and Doha, on opposite ends of the spectrum of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But neither country is so invested in challenging the policies of the other on Hamas to shake the foundations of the US-Qatar relationship, broadened well beyond what transpires in the Gaza Strip. The tiny state jutting into the Arabian Gulf, sitting on an...

The oil and gas industry is the most dynamic industry in the U.S. and will remain so for a long time, according to T. Boone Pickens, chairman of BP Capital Management, who spoke Monday during Gov. Tom Corbett's Jobs 1st Summit in Pittsburgh. "What an opportunity for our country with 30 of our states being producing states," he said. Pickens said the country should take advantage of its energy resources and convert its fleet of commercial heavy-duty trucks over to natural gas. And it should form a strategic energy alliance with Canada and Mexico. Those two things he said could...

The developer of Australia’s US$15bn Carmichael coal mine, one of the world’s largest fossil fuel projects, said it will start hiring the over 5,000 people it needs for the construction phase beginning next year. With the announcement, Adani Group —an Indian conglomerate with interests spanning mining, energy and logistics— has doubled the estimates made when the coal mine and rail project got its final approval. Designed to eventually produce 60 million tonnes of thermal coal a year, the project consists of six open-cut pits and up to five underground mines, to supply coal-hungry Indian power plants with enough of the...