"France May Revoke Shale Oil Permits in October, Minister Says"

Bloomberg:

France may quash permits to explore for oil and natural gas in shale under the country’s hydraulic fracturing ban as soon as next month, according to Environment Minister Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet.

Oil and gas companies that were planning to explore for shale hydrocarbons under previously granted licenses have until Sept. 13 to inform the government whether they plan to use the technique known as fracking, the minister said in an interview at a conference outside Paris.

“After that we have one month to decide the fate of the permits,” she said. “If a company says it’s planning to use hydraulic fracturing, their permit will be canceled. It’s the law.”

Perusteet, joilla lupia meinataan viedä vaikuttavat aika epämääräisiltä. Tuskin tämä on pysyvää. Pohjois-Amerikassa on frakattu tuhansia kaivoja ja vahinkojen määrä on olematon. Pelkoa ja hysteriaa on Amerikassakin, mutta noiden tunnetilojen saavuttaminen ei edellytä todellista uhkaa.

Suuri uutinen Ranskasta

France told to save the great hamster

PARIS: France has been punished for not taking proper care of its hamsters.

The Court of Justice in Luxembourg, the European Union's highest court, has ruled France failed to protect the great hamster of Alsace, sometimes known as the European hamster, the last wild hamster species in western Europe. If France does not adjust its agricultural and urbanisation policies to protect it, the court said, the government will be subject to fines of millions of euros.

Kauhiata. Karvaturreista eivät pidä huolta, mutta frakkaus kiellettiin pikavauhdilla. Sen pituinen se tarina tai ainakin ensimmäinen luku.

"France shale permits to be 'scrapped'"

Upstream:

French Prime Minister Francois Fillon said today that permits granted to explore potential shale fields in France must be cancelled and that the whole issue must be reviewed from the start.

TRGL näyttää ottaneen hieman nenukkiinsa. Itselläni salkuissa Lundinia ja Vermilionia, mutta näissä yhtiöissä on runsaasti substanssia ilman Liasin tiukkaa öljyä, joten niiden kurssit eivät tähän ole reagoineet mitenkään.

Ruottalainen Tethys Oil ilmoitti tänään hankkineensa reilun kolmanneksen osuuden Paris Basinin itäpuolella olevasta blokista. Tiedotteessa mainitaan jostain syystä kahdesti "conventional oil". Yrittävätkö vakuutella paikallisia vai vihjailla sijoittajille jotain?
Olen muuten ollut jo neljä vuotta Tethyksen postilistalla, mutta en ole missään vaiheessa omistanut yhtiötä. Ainuttakaan toimariakaan en ole osakkeista tehnyt.

Tällainen pätkä tuli vastaan viime viikolla:

A joint French Ministry press release issued on February 11,
2011, indicates that Vermilion is currently producing
approximately 63 boe/d from two previously stimulated vertical
wells in the Liassic shale in France. VET has approximately
176,000 net acres of land in the Paris basin and is in the process
of acquiring rights to up to 636,000 additional net acres.

Lias

Ranskan Bakkeniksi kutsuttu muodostelma:




Listtatuja pieniä ja keskikokoisia, jotka ovat mukana tällä hetkellä:

Lundin(SSE: LUPE)
Realm(Venture:)
Toreador(Nasdaq: TRGL )
Vermilion(TSX: VET)

Noiden lisäksi muutamilta juniori-sarjan yhtiöiltä löytyy oikeuksia potentiaalisimpana pidetyn alueen ulopuolelta(mm. Sterling Resources ja Elixir Petroleum). Melkein kaikki yrittävät lisätä oikeuksiensa määrää tällä hetkellä, mutta kaikki tuskin saavat haluamansa lisäoikeudet.

Liasiin liittymätön BNK Petroleum sai emissiolla 60 miljoonaa dollaria Sorosin Quantumilta muutama viikko sitten ja Realm tiedotti torstaina saaneensa 6 miljoonaa samalta taholta.

Linkkejä(uutisia & geologiaa):

Paris Basin Shale Oil Could have more recoverable oil than the Bakken oil field(syyskuu 2010)

Paris Oil Drillers Target 100 Billion Barrels Near Brie, Wine(lokakuu 2010)

Uutisia

Iso erä, mutta paljon mielenkiintoista asiaa:

BP Makes Nineteenth Oil Discovery in Ultra-Deepwater Block 31 Angola

"Sociedade Nacional de Combustíveis de Angola (Sonangol) and BP Exploration (Angola) Limited today announced the 'Tebe' oil discovery in ultra-deepwater Block 31, offshore Angola

This is the nineteenth discovery made by BP in Block 31 and is located in the southern portion of Block 31 some 350 kilometres northwest of Luanda and about 12 kilometres to the south east of the Hebe discovery.

Tebe was drilled in a water depth of 1752 metres and reached a total depth of 3325 metres below sea level. The well results confirmed the capacity of the reservoir to flow in excess of 5,000 barrels a day under production conditions."

Toreador sticks with French play

"Toreador Resources is refining its focus to concentrate solely on France's onshore play after selling off its Turkish and Hungarian operations in a deal worth a combined $16.4 million..."

"Toreador's chief executive Craig McKenzie said: "We expect that the proceeds of these transactions will enable us to continue repurchasing a portion of our convertible notes, and to continue delivering our corporate strategy to develop the low-risk conventional exploration of our French acreage and to plan our 'proof of concept' phase for the unconventional exploitation of the Paris basin oil shale."

Yhtiön johto ei vakuuta, mutta tässä saattaa olla jotain. Tai sitten ei. OOIP on Paris basinissa merkittävä, joten jos yhtiö saisi nostettua talteenottoa voisi sillä olla merkittävä vaikutus. Alueella operoivat myös Vermilion Energy Trust ja Lundin Petroleum. Vermilion taitaa olla nykyään Ranskan suurin öljyntuottaja.

Big find spurs California dreamin'

"A few years ago, Occidental Petroleum Corp. executive Stephen Chazen sounded like a cryptologist out of a Dan Brown novel as he told investors that an oil bonanza awaited any outfit that could “crack the code” of California's seismically fractured underground.

Occidental's engineers may have done it.

The Los Angeles-based company revealed in July that it had found 150 million to 250 million barrels of oil and natural gas in an undisclosed part of Kern County using techniques that the oil company's executives would rather not talk about. It was California's biggest find in 35 years.

Some experts say it could herald a period of new exploration in California and the U.S..."

"Occidental has mainly been drilling in Elk Hills, where it owns an 80 percent stake, and two nearby oil fields — Asphalto and Buena Vista — where it had acquired drilling rights, Leggate said. The most intriguing possibility, he said, was that Occidental found a rare instance in which seismic activity had shoved oil-rich strata a mile or two deeper than in nearby fields, thus hiding the oil from previous drillers.

“In our view, Oxy's declared discovery may only scratch the surface of the ultimate potential of its acreage in the San Joaquin basin,” Leggate said. “We suggest the resource potential could reasonably exceed 1 billion barrels."

TransCanada to build $1.2B Ont. power plant

"TransCanada Corp. added to its growing suite of electricity generation, announcing Monday it will build a $1.2 billion power plant in southern Ontario.

Better known for its vast Canadian network of natural gas pipelines, TransCanada said it will build, own and operate the 900-megawatt plant near Oakville, Ont. The plant will be fired by natural gas and start producing electricity by 2013..."

Refiners May Violate Credit Terms as U.S. Fuel Demand Sputters

" Oct. 1 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. refiners may fail to meet financial requirements of their credit agreements later this year as slumping fuel demand erodes the profitability of making gasoline and diesel.

Independent refiners, which don’t have oil and natural-gas wells to fall back on, are being pushed to the brink of violating performance covenants of their loans, said Scott Van Bergh, energy banking chief for the Americas at Bank of America Merrill Lynch in New York. Bankers and analysts say Western Refining Inc., Tesoro Corp. and Alon USA Energy Inc. are among those fuel makers at risk of failing to meet debt terms..."

ATWOOD OCEANICS Announces Drilling Program for ATWOOD BEACON

"a Houston-based International Drilling Contractor, announced that the ATWOOD BEACON (owned and operated by our wholly-owned subsidiary, Atwood Oceanics Pacific Limited) has been awarded a contract by Hess Equatorial Guinea, Inc. to drill offshore Equatorial Guinea under a firm program of six (6) wells (estimated to take 240 days to complete) with options to extend the program to drill up to six additional wells. If all options are exercised, the drilling program could be extended for another 240 days.

The contract provides for an operating dayrate for all firm and option wells of $110,000 plus a mobilization fee of $950,000. In anticipation of this contract award, the rig had previously been relocated from India to Singapore; whereby, it is currently loaded on a dry transport vessel for the mobilization to Equatorial Guinea, which will take approximately thirty (30) days..."

Atwood kuuluu huonojen sopimusneuvottelijoiden joukkoon Priden kanssa ja tämä kyllä näyttää heikolta sopimukselta. Beacon on 6 vuotta vanha ultra premium 400 jalan jaloilla.

Isoa ja pientä uutista

Chinese firm makes major acquisition in Alberta's oilsands

Lula Increases State Control Over Brazil Oil Reserves

Baker Hughes shells out $5.5bn for BJ

Toreador Zeroes in on Paris Basin Oil Shale for Future Developments