OCT. 26 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan-focused energy company Nostrum Oil & Gas posted a 12% fall in oil output in the first nine months of 2016, compared to the daily average it maintained in the same period last year. Lower production and sustained low oil prices meant that revenues in Jan.-Sept. 2016 fell by 35%, compared to last year.
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(News report from Issue No. 302, published on Oct. 28 2016)
OCT. 25 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — KMG EP, a London-traded subsidiary of Kazakhstan’s state owned Kazmunaigas, said its oil production in the first nine months of the year fell by 1.3% to 9.1m tonnes, compared to the same period last year. Importantly, production from Ozenmunaigas and Embamunaigas, two of its loss-making subsidiaries in the west of the country, grew by 1% in this period.
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(News report from Issue No. 302, published on Oct. 28 2016)
OCT. 28 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Amsterdam-based Nostrum Oil & Gas continues to navigate through the troubled waters of low oil prices. Its stock has rallied heavily in recent weeks.
The positive trend in the London stock market could be tied to the promises of a better 2017, when the company aims to complete an expansion and boost production.
CEO Kai-Uwe Kessel is confident production will more than double in just two years. “Our main focus continues to be the completion of GTU3, which is on track to be delivered on budget in 2017, and which will more than double our production capacity,” Mr Kessel said in a statement.
In the first part of 2016, however, average daily production fell to around 36,000 barrels. Now the company says that it expects to boost output to 40,000 barrels/day by year end. Sustained low oil prices, together with production and sales hiccups, have hit revenues, down 35% in the first nine months of 2016 to $240m, compared to the same period last year.
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(News report from Issue No. 302, published on Oct. 28 2016)
OCT. 17 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan produced 31.27m tonnes of oil and gas condensate in the first nine months of the year, the State Statistics Committee said, a drop of 0.3% from last year. Oil is the mainstay of the Azerbaijani economy and the government has been urging oil companies, in particular BP, to increase the amount of oil they produce. Gas production, the statistics committee said, has risen.
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(News report from Issue No. 301, published on Oct. 21 2016)
OCT. 19 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Roxi Petroleum, a Kazakhstan-based oil and gas company, said it had successfully drilled new wells at its BNG Contract Area, a group of oil fields in western Kazakhstan. Roxi said the drilling of the A6 deep well had been challenging, but that the expansion of the field was continuing as planned. On the day of the announcement, its stock price increased by 18% to 10.5p in London.
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(News report from Issue No. 301, published on Oct. 21 2016)
OCT. 18 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – KazTransOil, Kazakhstan’s state owned oil pipeline operator, said that the first shipments of oil from Kashagan will be allocated to the Atyrau-Samara pipeline and sold at the Russian port of Ust-Luga, near St. Petersburg. Production at Kashagan re-started last week after years of delay. In October, the consortium plans to pump at 90,000 barrels/day. The Kazakh government is banking on Kashagan to propel it into the Premier League of oil producers.
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(News report from Issue No. 301, published on Oct. 21 2016)
OCT. 14 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Turkmenistan and the Islamic Development Bank (IDB) signed a $700m loan deal for the construction of the so-called TAPI gas pipeline that will pump Turkmen gas to India via Afghanistan and Pakistan.
This is an important deal, not just because of its size, but also because it brings a second major international institution into the project. Turkmenistan has been powering the project, kicking off construction in December, but, up until now, Western companies and financial institutions, other than the Manila- based Asian Development Bank, have steered away from joining it.
Now, though, after months of negotiations, the normally publicity shy Turkmen Bank for Foreign Economic Activities met up with the IDB in Washington DC to agree the loan.
Through its official news website, Turkmenistan lauded the deal.
“The construction of the transnational gas pipeline will ensure the long-term supply of energy in the countries of Southeast Asia and will ensure further economic development in the region,” it said.
For months, Turkmenistan has negotiated with IDB and other international financial institutions for loans and grants. The Asian Development Bank, adviser to the project, agreed a $200m loan in April, when it also said the project was ‘doable’.
Others have been less impressed, calling the project, literally, a pipe- dream that couldn’t be done.
And it is certainly a challenge. The plan is to build a 1,800km pipeline from Turkmenistan across Afghanistan to Pakistan and India. The cost of the pipeline is estimated at $10b.
The IDB, which is headquartered in Jeddah, has not commented on the $700m loan for TAPI.
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(News report from Issue No. 301, published on Oct. 21 2016)
TBILISI, OCT. 14 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Georgian energy minister Ilia Eloshvili signed a deal for Georgia to join Europe’s Energy Community, meaning that it will now impose various EU rules and regulations over its electricity and gas networks.
For Georgia, joining the Energy Community is another step towards integrating its economy, and in this case energy network, more closely with the EU.
Earlier this year it entered into an Association Agreement with the EU which will make it easier to sell goods in Europe and this month EU members states said that Georgia should receive visa-free access to the Schengen zone.
At the signing ceremony in Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia Herzegovina, Mr Eloshvili was clear about Georgia’s overall intentions.
“By receiving the status of the contracting party, we plan to embark on the implementation of new round of reforms for approximating Georgia’s energy sector with the European Union energy market rules,” media quoted him as saying.
Georgia had said in February that it wanted to join the Energy Community. Along with EU member states, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Serbia and Ukraine are members of the Energy Community.
Georgia is expected to become a member next year after its parliament ratifies the deal and Dominique Ristori, director general for Energy at the European Commission said it would give the project momentum.
“With yet another new country joining the Energy Community family, this framework for the creation of a pan-European energy system is once again showing that it is relevant and successful,” he said.
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(News report from Issue No. 301, published on Oct. 21 2016)
OCT. 20 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – A court in Kazakhstan slapped a 2.1b tenge ($6.23m) fine on Ural Oil and Gas, a small energy company, for environmental damage. According to the prosecutor, the company had illegally disposed of its drilling waste at its operations in the Fedorovsky Bloc in Western Kazakhstan. State-owned Kazmunaigas (50%) and Hungary’s MOL (27.5%) are the two largest shareholders in Ural.
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(News report from Issue No. 301, published on Oct. 21 2016)
OCT. 18 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Iran and Turkmenistan signed a swap deal to, essentially, send 1b cubic metres of Turkmen gas to Azerbaijan every year.
The deal means that Iran will become a land bridge between Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan, potentially giving gas supplies to Europe a boost.
Under the deal, Turkmenistan will send 1b cubic metres of gas to Iran’s northern border and Iran will then deliver the equivalent to its border with Azerbaijan.
The swap deal is both an improvement for regional gas transport and an advantageous arrangement for Iran. Iran suffers from gas shortages in its north-east and supplies from Turkmenistan, besides generating transit revenues, will also help reduce this deficit.
For Turkmenistan the deal is an essential part of its diversification strategy. Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan have long touted a pipeline running across the Caspian Sea that could pump Turkmen gas westwards to Europe, as part of the wider Southern Gas Corridor network. This would secure valuable supplies from the region to Europe by giving Azerbaijan’s gas sector, which needs extra gas to fill the prospective TAN- AP-TAP pipeline network, a boost and also allow Turkmenistan to reduce its dependence on China.
The sticking point for a Caspian Sea pipeline has been Russia, though.
Russia has repeatedly said that a trans-Caspian pipeline would have to be approved by all littoral states and has, at times, threatened the use of force against unilateral decisions.
This swap deal, potentially, creates a way to send oil shipments from Turkmenistan to Azerbaijan, and then on to Europe, using Iran as a land bridge.
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(News report from Issue No. 301, published on Oct. 21 2016)
