Energy News Monitor I Volume X, Issue 25

India Oil Outlook 2035 Lydia Powell, Observer Research Foundation

 

 

 

 

NEWS BRIEF

OIL & GAS

December 1, 2013. GAIL (India) Ltd., the country’s biggest natural gas distributor, has lost out on a bid to acquire Ophir Energy’s stake in gas blocks in Tanzania to Singapore’s Pavilion Energy. GAIL was keen to buy part of Ophir Energy Plc’s 40% stake in blocks 1, 3 and 4, which are estimated to hold an estimated 15 trillion cubic feet (tcf) of gas reserves. It was, however, outbid by Pavilion which offered to pay $1.3 billion for a 20% stake in three gas blocks offshore Tanzania in East Africa. GAIL had put a price of about $600 million for a 10% interest. Pavilion Energy announced the acquisition saying the transaction is scheduled to be completed in the first quarter of 2014. The acquisition will help the company diversify its supply of LNG to meet growing Asian demand just as Singapore vies to become a gas-trading hub. The first deliveries from Tanzania blocks are scheduled to start in 2020. BG Group is the operator of the three blocks with 60% stake. With Ophir, GAIL was hoping to follow footsteps of ONGC Videsh Ltd (OVL) into hyrocarbon-rich Africa. OVL has in two transactions acquired 20% stake in a giant gas block off Mozambique for over $5 billion. (www.livemint.com)

December 1, 2013. Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) has bid for three oil and gas blocks and ONGC Videsh Ltd (OVL) for two in Myanmar's maiden offshore licensing round. Besides RIL and OVL, Oil India Ltd (OIL) and GAIL have bid for three exploration blocks each in separate joint venture with local companies, according to the Myanmar Ministry of Energy. Cairn India, which was among the 61 firms pre-qualified to bid for 11 shallow water and 19 deep water blocks on offer in an international tender, however, did not bid. The Ministry declared the companies bidding but did not reveal which company has bid for which block. Bidders were allowed to submit a maximum of three bids each. They had to necessarily team up with at least one Myanmarese company to bid for shallow water blocks while they could do so independently for the deepwater blocks. GAIL bid for three blocks with Kris Energy while OIL teamed up with Mercator Petroleum and Oil Max Energy Pte Ltd to bid for three blocks. The bidding pattern indicates that RIL and OVL may have bid for deepwater blocks while OIL and GAIL may have opted for shallow water areas. Myanmar is also offering 18 blocks in its second onshore licensing round, for which OVL, Cairn, OIL, and HPCL-owned Prize Petroleum are among the 59 companies pre-qualified. OVL and GAIL already have stakes in A-1 and A-3 blocks in Myanmar, which started production, and they are looking at consolidating their position in the energy-rich nation. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)

November 27, 2013. ONGC is likely to buy stakes in 9 exploration blocks that BHP Billiton decided to surrender. This move is seen as the government's desperate attempt to woo Australia's mining giant back into India ahead of the next round of NELP bidding in January 2014 and send a positive signal to international investors. Over half-a-dozen international firms have exited exploration activities in India after inordinate delay in getting government approvals. The latest being the decision of BHP Billiton, which surrendered oil blocks with potential reserves of 10 billion barrels of oil equivalent. BHP holds 26 per cent interest in the six blocks awarded during NELP-7 and 100 per cent in the three blocks awarded during NELP-8. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)

November 27, 2013. With ONGC diversifying into non- core areas like power and fertiliser, Petroleum Secretary Vivek Rae said the nation's high profit making PSU should sell its non-core assets and concentrate on increasing oil and gas production. As a result, oil producer Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) is now operating power plants, bought a refinery, opened petrol pumps and is planning a fertiliser unit, while refiner Indian Oil Corp (IOC) is taking upstream exploration blocks. Rae asked if ONGC should to start operating petrol pumps and selling petrol and diesel instead of focusing on finding and producing more oil and gas which was of more vital importance for an energy deficit country like India. Rae said companies like ONGC which have financial muscles can set up a power plant in Tripura or set up a fertiliser plant to monetise the gas for which there are no takers. It can also take over Mangalore Refinery and then turn it around. This way, a company like ONGC can generate enough return on its capital as well as keep its focus on its core competence of oil and gas exploration and production. Rae however said his suggestion to ONGC top brass to divest their non-core assets have not generated favourable response so far. ONGC's diversification into non-core business like fuel retailing, oil refining and petrochemicals had even previously raised eyebrows in the oil ministry and the company had to briefly go slow on these projects. But it has again started these. (www.business-standard.com)

November 29, 2013. Indian Oil Corp (IOC) is planning to expand the capacity of its largest refinery at Panipat to 21 million tonne, Oil Minister M Veerappa Moily said. Currently, it has a capacity to turn 15 million tonne of crude oil per annum into refined petroleum products or fuel. IOC said the expansion plan was at the drawing board stage and investments have not yet been firmed up. As a thumb-rule, it could cost about $ 1 billion. The expansion may be accompanied by raising capacity of the adjacent petrochemical complex. The nation’s largest refiner is also exploring the possibility of expanding capacity at its Koyali refinery in Gujarat from 13.7 million tonne to 18 million tonne, at a cost of about ` 5,500 crore. IOC currently has the refining capacity of 65 million tonne, which is being expanded to 80 million tonne. (www.thehindu.com)

November 27, 2013. Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL) has offered a rare high sulphur gasoil cargo for loading in late December due to a planned maintenance at its Mumbai refinery. The refiner seldom imports or exports gasoil unless there is an issue or maintenance at its refineries. BPCL has offered 45,000 tonnes of gasoil with a sulphur content of up to 1 percent, or 10,000 parts-per-million (ppm) for loading from Mumbai over Dec. 23 to 27. The state refiner plans to close a 4,470 barrels per day (bpd) diesel unit for maintenance at its 240,000 bpd Mumbai plant over December to January. It also expects to shut a 50,000 bpd crude processing facility and a 21,125 bpd fluid catalytic cracker in Mumbai. The units will be shut for 25-30 days. The high sulphur gasoil cargo was meant to be feedstock for the secondary unit. (articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com)

November 30, 2013. The first phase of the City Gas project in Kochi, which envisages supply of gas to households through pipelines, is expected to be ready by December next year. Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Authority Board (PNGRAB) had recently notified Ernakulam District for the City Gas project. Nearly five lakh residents of Kochi city and nearby areas would be benefited by the project, when completed. There was no need for any apprehensions and it was a safe project. Ernakulam is the only district in Kerala to get the project. Pune, Thane, Ranga Reddy and Medak districts in Andhra Pradesh and Bengaluru Rural and Urban are among the districts which have been notified. GAIL said Natural gas was the fuel of 21^st century and was very safe. Since it was lighter than air, even if there was leakage it would get easily diluted. GAIL said this was the first time a state government had given blanket permission for the pipelines crossing water bodies, roads among others under government control. The first phase of the project from Kochi-Kootanad is almost complete and from Kootanad-Mangalore, the work has come to a standstill due to the protests. Of the 505 km pipeline passing through Kerala, only 52 km has been completed. The pipeline network covers 310 km in Tamil Nadu and 70 km in Karnataka. The Madras High Court has recently set aside a Tamil Nadu Government order against the laying of pipelines through farm lands, thus clearing work of GAIL pipeline network. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)

November 27, 2013. The government's decision to finally notify the new pricing formula that will double gas prices from April is a blow to city gas distribution firms as piped gas for households will not be able to compete with heavily subsidised LPG, while diesel at state-set rates will be much more economical for automobiles. City gas firms say the country's target to supply the clean fuel in 300 cities will be difficult to achieve because customers will not use natural gas in automobiles and kitchens if it is very costly. These firms already use imported liquefied natural gas (LNG), which costs about $18 per unit, while domestic gas price will double to $8.4 when the Rangarajan formula, that calculates the price using international benchmarks, is implemented in April next year. In 2007 when government constituted regulatory body for gas distribution activities, India was aiming to roll out gas distribution network in over 300 cities, which has remained limited to only about 50 geographical areas as of now. The majority of city gas distribution entities are controlled by state firms GAIL, IOC, BPCL and HPCL while private players are losing interests due to uncertainties over gas supplies and pricing. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)

December 3, 2013. A proposal to implement the five-month old decision to uniformly raise gas prices will be sent to the Cabinet soon after the finance ministry sends its views, petroleum minister Veerappa Moily said. The government did not notify the Cabinet-approved gas price formula in June as some departments did not want to allow Reliance Industries to charge higher price as it has been blamed for the steep fall in output. The oil ministry proposed that Reliance Industries to secure bank guarantees from RIL, which would be encashed if the company were found guilty of hoarding gas produced from its D6 gas fields. Earlier it was considering denying new rates to gas produced from the block's old fields. The pricing formula, which is based on international benchmarks, would be effective from April for five years. The new formula is expected to double the price to $8.4 per unit. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)

December 3, 2013. Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) said it will appeal against the Gujarat High Court order asking it to pay up to ` 10,000 crore in past royalty dues, saying it cannot pay the levy on a price it hasn't realised. The Gujarat High Court (HC) had directed ONGC to pay royalty on crude oil on the gross price it bills to refiners. The company currently pays royalty on the net or actual price realised after allowing for fuel subsidy discounts. As per government mandate, ONGC offers discounts on crude oil to make up for a part of the losses refiners suffer on selling diesel, cooking gas (LPG) and kerosene at government controlled rates. The company produces about 6 million tonnes crude oil per year from Gujarat and if the order is to be implemented, it will have to pay ` 9,000 crore to ` 10,000 crore in past dues from 2008. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)

December 2, 2013. The oil ministry may soon move a Cabinet note allowing exploration of shale resources by private firms in blocks held by them, a move that comes at a time when it is also preparing the ground for launching the fifth round of bidding for coal bed methane blocks after a gap of more than three years. The government also plans to extend, albeit with a few stringent conditions, the recently approved shale exploration policy which allows only ONGC and Oil India to explore shale resources in their existing oil and gas blocks. The ministry has proposed automatic extension of lease period in blocks held by private companies if they are interested in exploring shale oil and gas. But only such blocks will get extension where the lease will expire after two years. Energy explorers have slammed this condition for extension. About two dozen energy firms, including Cairn India, ONGC, Reliance Industries, BP and BG, are members of Association of Oil and Gas Operators (AOGO). Oil ministry, however, justified the cut-off date to avoid the misuse of shale exploration policy. The proposed unified exploration policy will allow energy firms to explore all kinds of oil and gas resources, including shale gas and coal bed methane (CBM) in a block. Currently, operators get separate licences for exploring conventional oil and gas and CBM. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)

November 30, 2013. The state government said that it was not possible to supply piped natural gas (PNG) at the prices demanded by the ceramic units in Morbi district. The Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation (GSPC) had hiked the PNG price by ` 4.50 per standard cubic metre. However, following protests by the industry associations, it had reduced the prices by ` 2 per standard cubic metre. Over 550 ceramic units in Gujarat have been on an indefinite strike since November 27 against the recent rise in PNG prices by the GSPC. (www.indianexpress.com)

November 30, 2013. Cooking gas prices are expected to rise about ` 15 per cylinder after assembly elections as the oil ministry has agreed to review delivery charges that were fixed a decade ago. The ministry has also agreed to give oil firms should the freedom to revise transportation charges every quarter because their delivery costs increase with the monthly hike in diesel rates. The oil ministry does not require CCPA (cabinet committee on political affairs)'s approval in the normal course, but even a marginal hike in cooking gas price has political implications in the election year, the oil firms said. The industry expects a formal order announcing new delivery charges only after mid-December when assembly elections in the five states end. The new charges would raise cooking gas rates by a maximum ` 15 per cylinder for delivering cylinders beyond 110 kilometers. The impact would maximum on consumers living in hilly areas. The government determines the cost of transporting cooking gas cylinders from bottling plants to distributors, which is built in the consumer price. In April 2002, the government had approved three slabs of delivery charges ` 10, ` 12 and ` 14 — based on distance. (articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com)

November 29, 2013. Prices of Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) could go up by anything between ` 15 and ` 20 in Mumbai. The hike, which could be as high as 50%, taking rates from the current ` 38.95 per kg to a maximum of ` 59 per kg, could directly affect fares of taxis, autos, buses and fleet cabs. The price of piped natural gas (PNG) is also likely to go up by 40% to 60%, from the existing ` 24 per standard cubic meter (scm) to anywhere between ` 34 and ` 39 per scm, a move that may force many households to go back to subsidised cooking gas cylinders. Mahanagar Gas Ltd (MGL) said the rates would be increased because the Supreme Court had recently upheld a Gujarat high court order saying prices should be uniform across the country. CNG prices are not uniform across India due to short supply of gas. While some firms get subsidised APM (administered price mechanism) gas, others have to rely on expensive imported LNG. (articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com)

November 29, 2013. India, which is currently processing 215 million tonnes of crude oil, is expected to expand its annual processing capacity to 333 million tonnes by 2022, Oil Minister Veerappa Moily said. Moily said India is net exporter of refined products. Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) promotes the synthetic rubber-manufacturing unit. Moily said that the unit would meet the country's synthetic rubber demand, mostly consumed by the tyre manufacturers. The minister expressed concerns about rising import of crude oil, which is one of the reasons for depreciation of the rupee against dollar. India imported crude oil for more than ` 6.70 lakh crore in the previous financial year, he said. Moily said he had been working towards boosting oil and gas exploration and production, removing policy bottlenecks, improving investor sentiment and bringing in necessary reforms to achieve self reliance. (articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com)

November 29, 2013. The Government of Tamil Nadu has approached the Supreme Court (SC) of India seeking the apex court to quash the recent order of Madras High Court (HC), which gave a green signal to the gas pipeline project of the Gas Authority of India Limited (GAIL) through seven districts of Tamil Nadu. The Madras High Court has given a nod to the GAIL's pipeline project in Tamil Nadu and asked the State government to provide protection to the works preventing law and order issues. The division bench order was on a petition filed by GAIL seeking the High Court to quash the State government's order to stop execution of the project in its planned manner. The State government has stopped the project following protest from farmers' group and asked GAIL to look at options to realign the pipeline adjacent to the National Highway. The proposed gas pipeline is to carry natural gas from Kochi to Mangalore through a few districts in Tamil Nadu. (www.business-standard.com)

November 28, 2013. India is looking at ways to intensify engagement with Iran after the country's nuclear agreement with the P5+1 over the weekend. A strategy session chaired by national security adviser Shivshankar Menon with senior officials from the ministries of finance, shipping and petroleum zeroed in on three sectors where India would try to do something extra for Iran. An Iranian ship, Dinayat, has been stranded in Mundra port in Gujarat for the past year-and-a-half over some payments owed to a Singapore-based firm. The Iranian government has repeatedly urged India to release the ship but there was a court order to seize the ship. Iran has asked India to pay off the ship's debts from the huge amount of money kept in UCO Bank. India pays 45% of its oil payments to Iran in rupees. However, so far, India has refused to pay, because the ship is actually owned by Iran's infamous Revolutionary Guards who come under UN sanctions. India was worried that making payments on behalf of the Revolutionary Guards may be tantamount to violating the sanctions. But now, the government is looking for ways to circumvent this restriction to see if an exception can be made for Iran. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)

November 28, 2013. State oil firms may cut petrol prices days before Delhi's election scheduled on December 4, but company executives are waiting for a signal from the petroleum ministry before taking a decision. State firms review prices every fortnight but in mid-November, they did not change prices even though the changes in rupee cost of imported gasoline — the benchmark for domestic pricing — allowed them to cut fuel rates by about one rupee. Since the last price revision of October 31, when petrol rates were cut by ` 1.38 in Delhi, international prices are slightly softer, while the rupee is slightly weaker. However, industry officials say that if the trend remains favourable in the remaining days of the month, the price may be cut, particularly because consumers were denied the relief in the middle of November. Government officials, however, remain optimistic, particularly after the partial easing of Western sanctions against Iran, and are anxiously watching the movement of exchange rates and international oil prices. Company executives have a different view despite pressure to reduce petrol prices. But oil ministry officials said oil companies are free to revise petrol prices, which is a deregulated item and it would be their commercial decision. On November 15, the benchmark international petrol price had fallen by $2.40 per barrel and the rupee depreciated only marginally. (articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com)

November 27, 2013. Government does not see an immediate need for a local reinsurance fund for refiners, the oil secretary Vivek Rae said, after some trade sanctions with Iran were eased following a deal between Tehran and six world powers to curb the Islamic Republic's nuclear programme. Vivek Rae, however, said that India will continue its efforts towards forming a local reinsurance fund. He also said that Indian delegation will shortly visit Iran to discuss the oil payment mechanism, and will include representatives from the oil ministry, oil companies, refiners and the finance ministry. (www.business-standard.com)

POWER

December 2, 2013. The power generation from unit 1 of Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant (KNPP) was stopped in the wake of some technical snag. The power production was expected to resume in about two or three days after fixing the problem. The unit was generating around 400 MWe of power before the reactor stopped functioning. KNPP's unit 1 has been considerably contributing to the power-starved Tamil Nadu. Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL) is collaborating with Russia to set up two 1,000 MWe reactors at Kudankulam in Tirunelveli district. While the first unit attained criticality July 2013, the second unit is nearing completion. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)

December 2, 2013. With NTPC's power generation plant producing about one-third of its capacity due to lack of coal supply in wake of the violence in the Talcher coalfields here, efforts are on to resume power production in the central sector. As coal supply came to a grinding halt, the central PSU could generate only 1100 MW power against its capacity of 3,000 MW. Only 1100 MW power could be generated from three units of NTPC at Kanhia which has six units of 500 MW capacity each. Generally, 3000 MW of electricity is being produced at NTPC's Kanhia units. The drastic fall in generation had its bearing in the states purchasing power from NTPC as four southern states - Andhra Pradesh, Tamilnadu, Karnataka and Kerala - failed to get supply for last four days. However, Odisha could manage with the supply as it was not getting 250 MW of 512 MW power it procured from NTPC. However, the power generation has not been much affected at Nalco's power plant and at Talcher Thermal Power Station (TTPS) at Talcher which produced 1200 MW and 470 MW respectively. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)

November 27, 2013. Tata Power said it increased electricity generation by 62% in the first six months of current financial year. The country's largest private power producer generated 22,738 million units of electricity in the first half compared with 14,029 million units a year earlier, Tata Power said. The company said its installed capacity stands at about 8,521 MW. Coastal Gujarat Power Ltd (CGPL) operates the 4,000 MW ultra mega power project at Mundra in Gujarat while Maithon Power Ltd (MPL) runs the 1,050 Maithon plant in Jharkhand. Electricity generated from clean energy sources stood at 1,439 million units, or about 6% of the total, in the six months ended September. The utility aims to have 20-25% of its power generation from sources that don't release greenhouse gases. (www.business-standard.com)

December 3, 2013. Alstom T&D India is trading higher by 4% at ` 192 after the company said it has received order worth of ` 79 crore from the Power Grid Corporation of India (PGCIL) for supplying equipment at substations in Uttar Pradesh. The projects are due for delivery in 2015. The reactors are designed to maintain the voltage level, whatever the load, by limiting over-voltages which can occur due to sudden load decreases. (www.business-standard.com)

November 30, 2013. Power Ministry's for separation of "carriage and content" in distribution has received support from the Forum of Regulators (FOR) which is a representative body of central state electricity regulators. Ministry's move to amend the Electricity Act, 2003 is aimed at the introduction of competition in retail electricity supply. The ministry proposal is based on the Central Electricity Authority's recommendation in the recent report that the distribution system may be separated from supply of electricity with two separate licensees to two separate legal entities. However, FOR at its recent meeting held on November 18 opined that electricity being a concurrent subject, such a model should be implemented after wide consultation with stake holders including state Governments, state utilities, consumers, NGOs.  Besides, smaller States, especially, the hilly states may need separate treatment and the model may need to be modified accordingly. FOR also suggested that the consumers should not be burdened with dealing with two licensees separately. As per the proposed amendment, the distribution licensee will have an obligation to provide connection on demand to any consumer in its area of distribution. Further the incumbent supply licensee will have universal supply obligation to serve all the consumers in its area of supply. The subsequent supply licensee will have to have service obligation to supply on demand to all consumers of the specified voltage level for which supply licensee has been granted to it. The existing intra-state traders will be treated as deemed supply licensees with service obligation to supply on demand to all consumers of specified voltage level. However, FOR has suggested that the subsequent supply licences should be granted for the entire area co-terminus with the incumbent supply licensee, with the obligation to supply electricity to all the consumers in its area of supply. (www.business-standard.com)

November 29, 2013. Power distribution companies in Haryana -Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (DHBVN) and the Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam - plan to do away with the manual meter reading in a phased manner, and the reading of meters would be done through Common Meter Reading Instrument (CMRI). For consumers above 10-Kw of connected load, automatic meter reading (AMR) has been initiated. For the other consumers below 10-Kw load, meters with optical port, facilitating reading through CMRI, are being procured so as to eliminate manual meter reading and plug revenue leakage. Remote reading through data concentrator units is also being planned. (www.business-standard.com)

November 27, 2013. NTPC, India's leading power producer, has invited expression of interest (EoI) from foreign suppliers for inking a 10-15 year contract for 12 million tonnes coal that the company plans to import for its proposed 4,000 MW coal-fired plant at Pudimadaka near Anakapalle in Andhra Pradesh. The company is looking to get the first consignment of coal from this contract by 2018, by when it hopes to commission the plant which has been delayed due to the protests over Centre's decision to grant statehood to Telangana. The proposed coastal power plant will run entirely on high quality imported coal. Coal India had earlier tried to import coal on behalf of NTPC through a similar long-term contract a few years ago but the deal did not work out because the suppliers asked for a premium on the price for supplying coal on an uninterrupted basis for such a long period. NTPC found the prices higher than what it was paying for importing coal and Coal India shelved the plan. NTPC intends to import coal directly from mine owners, lease holders and suppliers that have experience in long-term supply. The supplier will be required to handle transportation of coal from mine to port, clearing and forwarding of the consignments, storage, coordination with port of country of origin and loading of coal consignment into vessels arranged by NTPC for shipping to India. It is looking for premium quality coal with just about 20% ash and 5,300-5,800 kilo calories of energy content in each kilogram. Domestic coal, in contrast, has 40% ash content and less than 3,000 kilo calories of energy content per kg. Indian boilers are made to handle coal with 40% ash content. However, the proposed plant will be made to handle such high energy content. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)

December 1, 2013. Inching closer to becoming a 10,000 MW utility, the country's largest hydro power producer NHPC plans to commission over 3,800 MW of projects over the next five years, the company said. Five projects with a combined capacity of 3,810 MW are behind their original commissioning schedules. The 2,000 MW Subansiri Lower project in Assam, which was expected to be commissioned by December 2012, is now likely to become operational by December 2017. It had been delayed since December 2011, after the local people raised issues related to its safety and downstream impact. The Teesta Low Dam Project-IV in West Bengal (160 MW) and Kishanganga in Jammu & Kashmir (330 MW) will be completed by November 2014 and November 2016, respectively. Parbati-II (800 MW) will be commissioned in March 2018. It had been scheduled to be ready by March this year. The company's Uri-II (240 MW) project in J&K was commissioned. NHPC generates 5,702 MW electricity from 17 hydel stations in the country. As many as seven power stations with a total capacity of 4,095 MW, including the five delayed projects, are under construction. (www.business-standard.com)

December 1, 2013. Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (BHEL) has commissioned its first 660 MW super critical thermal unit at a NTPC power plant in Bihar. The power equipment major on Sunday said its 660 MW Boiler Turbine Generator (BTG) unit, having super critical parameters, attained full load at the Barh thermal project. This package for Stage II Unit 4 of the project being implemented by NTPC. The maiden order for 660 MW sets were won from NTPC through international competitive bidding for this 1,320 MW project. At present, BHEL is executing orders for supply and installation of 27 steam generators and 24 turbines with supercritical parameters of 660 MW, 700 MW and 800 MW ratings. (www.thehindu.com)

December 1, 2013. The Andhra Pradesh (AP) government is initiating measures to provide seven hours of power supply to all the 3.2 million pump sets during the present rabi season under efficient energy management. The state government has so far spent around ` 32,000 crore for its free power scheme this year. Reviewing the restoration works with regard to Phailin and Helen cyclones, constraints in coal supply to power projects and proposed capacity additions, PK Mohanty, chief secretary and chairman of the State Energy Conservation Mission, has requested the authorities of NTPC and Talcher coal fields to resolve the coal crisis caused by local agitations and transport problems. The chief minister, N Kiran Kumar Reddy, is going to write a letter to the Union minister of petroleum and natural gas for additional allocation of natural gas from ONGC fields off the AP coast for state-based plants. According to the chief secretary, hydel generation has been a boon to the power sector and the generation has crossed 5,000 million units (MU) during April-November 2013, as against 2,000 MU generated during the same period last year. (www.business-standard.com)

December 1, 2013. The country's largest private power producer Tata Power is exploring various options to raise around ` 5,000 crore in the next three years. Tata Power, which has an installed generation capacity of over 8,500 MW, has also embarked on ambitious expansion plans, including setting up projects in Vietnam and Georgia. For raising funds, the power utility has said that it is studying all possible options. (www.business-standard.com)

November 29, 2013. Finland-based Wartsila's chief executive Bjorn Rosengren sees a good market for gas-fired plants in India, even if the fuel is imported at $20 per unit, almost five times the current domestic price of $4.2, if such plants are used to meet the fluctuating peak demand in combination with coal-based power stations that can meet the steady base demand.

The government is expected to notify the Rangarajan Formula in 20 days, which will double gas prices from April. This should help boost gas supplies, says the CEO of Wartsila, which earned a revenue of 4.7 billion euros from its operations in 70 countries. Wartsila, which has commissioned 3,500 MW of gas-based power generation capacity, largely for captive utilisation, is now planning to offer technologies to build hybrid plants consuming both natural gas and coal and commission LNG regasification terminals. The company will offer solutions for hybrid power plants using both coal and natural gas for higher efficiency and better capex utilisation. (timesofindia.indiatimes.com)

November 29, 2013. Increasing India’s nuclear capacity to 63,000 MW by 2032 from the present 4,780 MW was achievable, said R K Sinha, chairman, the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC). The chairman said the country was pursuing the capacity addition through both indigenously manufactured reactors and imported ones. Sinha said that currerntly there were seven nuclear plants under different stages of development. These include two units at Kudankulam in Tamil Nadu (2x1000 MW), Kakrapar in Gujarat (2x700 MW), Rawatbhata in Rajasthan (2x700 MW) and prototype fast breeder reactor of 500 MW at Kalpakkam. This will increase the nuclear capacity to 10,080 MW by 2017. According to Sinha, the state-run Nuclear Power Corporation (NPC) is in talks with foreign firms to develop light water reactors with unit sizes ranging between 1,000 and 1,650 MW. (www.business-standard.com)

November 28, 2013. India will halt a $20 billion plan by Tata group and Jindal Steel & Power Ltd. (JSP) to turn coal into crude oil after scrapping rights to two mining blocks allotted to the companies. The coal mines, located in the eastern state of Odisha, are part of 11 blocks to be canceled because their development was lagging behind schedule. New Delhi-based Jindal Steel and Strategic Energy Tech. System Ltd., a venture of Sasol Ltd. (SOL) and Tata, had planned to produce a combined 160,000 barrels of crude oil a day, valued at about $6.2 billion annually based on average Brent prices this year. Bureaucratic hurdles are holding up India’s maiden attempt to produce synthetic crude oil from coal and cut imports, as a probe into corruption in coal mine allocations prompts state officials to defer decisions. Delayed approvals thwarted development at Jindal’s mines, while the Tata venture is awaiting clearance from the regional government to start prospecting, more than four years after the allocation. The Odisha government is examining the documents submitted by the companies. India spent a record $144.3 billion to import 184.8 million tons of crude oil in the year ended March 31, almost a third of the nation’s total import bill. To curb dollar outflow, the government changed the law in 2007 to allocate coal blocks for coal-to-liquid projects and allocated the first two blocks in 2009 after considering more than 20 applications. India, the world’s fifth-largest coal producer, has resources of 293.5 billion metric tons, of which 118.1 billion tons are proven, according to the coal ministry. Almost 80 percent of the production comes from state-run Coal India Ltd., the world’s biggest coal miner, and more than 70 percent of the coal is used to generate electricity. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 27, 2013. The coal ministry will initiate action against nearly 60 companies for moving slow in mining coal blocks allocated to them for captive use. The ministry will be sending notices to developers of 48 coal blocks, seeking an explanation for delay in development of mines. Other companies will also be issued notices soon. The companies facing action include steelmaker Tata Steel, aluminium and copper producer Hindalco Industries, and power producers NTPC, Essar Power and Adani Power. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)

November 27, 2013. Eyeing the huge Indian nuclear market, top Canadian atomic equipment companies along with 128-member Organization of Canadian Nuclear Industries (OCI) will visit Mumbai to discuss business opportunities with Indian firms. The visit is aimed at understanding the companies, their requirements and the overall potential of the country’s nuclear industry. Though India and Canada inked the pact in 2010, it came into force in September this year.

Under the agreement, not only India will get technological expertise from Canadian companies on various fronts, but Canada will also help the country to import uranium from there which is crucial for India’s nuclear power reactors. (www.livemint.com)

OIL & GAS

December 2, 2013. PTT Exploration & Production Pcl (PTTEP), Thailand’s biggest publicly listed oil and natural gas explorer, and PT Pertamina agreed to buy Hess Corp.’s Indonesian assets for $1.3 billion. PTTEP, and the Indonesian state-owned oil company will buy a 75 percent interest in the Pangkah oil field, located in the East Java Sea, and a 23 percent stake in the Natuna Sea A gas field in the West Natuna Sea, Bangkok-based PTTEP said. PTTEP has expanded its investments to 45 projects in 12 countries, including last year’s acquisition of Cove Energy Plc’s oil and gas assets in Mozambique for $1.6 billion, to diversify output. The company said in July that sales from its Zawtika project near Myanmar will begin commercial production in the first quarter of next year. The fields produced a net average of 15,000 barrels of oil equivalent a day during the first three quarters, New York-based Hess said. The Pangkah field has daily output of 7,000 barrels of oil and 33 million cubic feet of gas, while the Natuna Sea A field produces 220 million cubic feet of gas and 2,350 barrels of oil a day, PTTEP said. The two fields have combined reserves of about 319 million barrels of oil equivalent, it said. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 30, 2013. Vietnam is likely to maintain its current oil production level of about 340,000 barrels per day “for the next few years,” according to state-owned Vietnam Oil & Gas Group. Vietnamese oil production rose 10 percent last year to 348,000 barrels per day, the highest level of output for the country since 2006, according to figures from BP Plc. Vietnam has the second-highest level of oil reserves in East Asia, with its 4.4 billion barrels exceeded only by China, based on BP estimates. About 40 percent of Vietnam’s output comes from fields operated by the Vietsovpetro joint venture, said Le Ngoc Son, general manager of oil and gas production for Vietnam Oil & Gas, known as PetroVietnam. The Vietsovpetro venture between PetroVietnam and Russia’s OAO Zarubezhneft operates Vietnam’s oldest field, known as Bach Ho, which began production in 1986. Soco International Plc, a London-based company operating the Te Giac Trang field that averaged 45,132 barrels of oil per day production in the first 10 months of the year, said that an exploration well drilled on the Vietnamese field tested more than 27,600 barrels of oil equivalent per day. Vietnam’s oil production comes from fields in the South China Sea off the country’s southern coast. Recent discoveries in Vietnam have tended to be smaller and within reservoirs with complex geological and geophysical conditions and in more remote and challenging waters. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 28, 2013. Eni SpA sees Mozambique, its planned base for African output, struggling to meet a 2018 deadline to build plants allowing the country to ship liquefied natural gas. Eni plans to spend $28 billion on African development over four years with average annual growth in output of 3.2 percent. The company plans to invest $3.5 billion in exploration in the period, drilling 140 wells, and achieve a new-resource unit cost of $1.2 a barrel. Eni has found 75 trillion cubic feet of gas in the offshore fields of its Area 4, more than the current reserves of Norway. Mozambique plans to build four LNG units with total capacity of 20 million metric tons a year by 2018, making it the largest LNG export site after Ras Laffan in Qatar. It may cost $20 billion. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 27, 2013. Chariot Oil & Gas Ltd., a U.K. energy explorer in Africa, said it’s continuing to search for oil in Namibia even after competitors failed to find crude. Namibia has attracted attention from the world’s biggest oil companies even after 18 wells in past decades failed to find commercial deposits of crude. Explorers such as BP Plc and Repsol SA have snapped up assets on a bet that the nation’s coastal shelf may mirror that of Brazil across the Atlantic. Chariot holds licenses in eight blocks in the southern African country. It plans to bring in a partner and a rig to continue exploration. The company will also seek a partner for its Mauritania block, where it plans to drill in 2015. Chariot will decide where to drill in the C-19 Block in the first quarter. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 2, 2013. Azerbaijan's state oil fund said it had invested $475 million to help fund construction of the new Star oil refinery in the west of Turkey. The fund said it would provide another $300 million next year for the $5 billion refinery project, which aims to start production in mid-2017 with an annual crude processing capacity of 10 million tonnes. Azeri state energy company SOCAR is building the Star refinery in partnership with Turcas Petrol to supply Turkish petrochemical company Petkim and reduce Turkey's dependence on imported refined products. The $34 billion Azeri state oil fund invests the revenue from its oil contracts, oil and gas sales, transit fees and other revenues and uses the proceeds to help finance social spending and infrastructure projects. (in.reuters.com)

December 3, 2013. Royal Dutch Shell Plc, General Electric Co. (GE) and a company co-founded by T. Boone Pickens are planning investments in natural-gas-powered shipping as record U.S. output spurs the merchant fleet to use a new fuel. Clean Energy Fuels Corp., which Pickens helped start, will begin construction next year on the country’s first fuel station for cargo ships running on liquefied natural gas in Jacksonville, Florida. Shell said it’s planning LNG plants for the Great Lakes and Gulf Coast. GE, evaluating five locations, says the U.S. will need 50 to 100 small-scale plants for ships, trains, mining and trucks by 2025, each costing $50 million to $150 million. While the maritime industry still relies on oil-based products for almost all its fuel, tighter emissions rules and abundant natural gas are convincing ship owners to switch. The global fleet of 42 LNG-powered ships will almost triple by next year and increase 42-fold to almost 1,800 vessels by 2020, according to DNV GL, the largest company certifying the merchant fleet for safety. Natural gas output in the U.S., the world’s largest producer, rose to 2.198 trillion cubic feet in August, the highest since at least 1973, according to the latest Energy Department data. Marketed production will expand 1.1 percent to 71.03 billion cubic feet a day in 2014, the department estimates. The first LNG-fueled ship, a Norwegian ferry built in 2000, is one of 42 in operation worldwide, out of about 60,000 merchant vessels, according to DNV GL. Most are small ferries and vessels that shuttle supplies to offshore oil platforms. Tankers hauling LNG in world trade have long used it for fuel through a process known as boil-off. Thirty-seven new LNG-fueled ships and two conversions are on order, scheduled for delivery in the next three years. By 2020, 1,068 new vessels will be built and 600 to 700 will be converted to run on the fuel, DNV GL says. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 3, 2013. Japan OTC Exchange Inc., formed by Ginga Energy Japan and Tokyo Commodity Exchange Inc., may introduce over-the-counter trading in liquefied natural gas derivatives on its new platform scheduled to start in April. The joint venture plans to offer non-deliverable LNG forward contracts by October. The contracts, known as NDFs in foreign exchange markets, are cash-settled on expiration against a fixed date. Over-the-counter trading in LNG may help establish benchmark prices that can be used for a cash-settled futures contract being proposed by the government. Japan, the biggest buyer of the fuel used to generate electricity, plans to list the world’s first LNG futures contract on the Tokyo Commodity Exchange, or Tocom, in 2015. Ginga, which has a 60 percent stake in Japan OTC Exchange, will help match participants with counter-parties who can buy or sell spot cargoes of LNG if they wish to exchange their derivative positions for physical ones. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 2, 2013. NITC, the Tehran-based company that is the biggest owner of supertankers, said it’s hopeful that last month’s agreement between Iran and world powers will eventually lead to an easing of sanctions on its fleet. The U.S. and European Union said they will ease sanctions against Iran in return for concessions over its nuclear program. Oil importers won’t be allowed to buy more from Iran and EU and U.S. sanctions on NITC remain in place. Most of NITC tankers delivered Iran’s oil to the nation’s customers since sanctions intensified. The ships sailed to countries including China, India, South Korea and Taiwan since July last year, when European measures barred most non-Iranian tankers from the trade. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 2, 2013. Ghana faces persistently low agricultural growth and a huge prosperity gap between the oil-producing south and the north, which relies on subsistence farming, the U.S. Agency for International Development said in a report. The imbalance mirrors that of Nigeria, Africa’s biggest oil producer, which imports more than $10 billion worth of food a year. Ghana’s oil exports from the Tullow Oil Plc-run Jubilee field began three years ago, and the government expects to more than double output to 250,000 barrels a day by 2021 as the $4.5 billion offshore TEN project comes online in 2016. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 2, 2013. Canada’s bid to become what Prime Minister Stephen Harper calls an energy “superpower” is at risk as approval delays for new pipelines threaten an industry already hurt by high costs and rival production. The world’s sixth-largest crude producer can’t get its surging crude supplies to markets in Asia where prices are higher than in North America. Decisions in the next year or so on proposed pipelines designed to connect oil-sands production to supertankers on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts may set the tone for the future of the nation’s energy industry. Prime Minister Harper is counting on Asian markets to reduce the $30 a barrel discount between Canadian heavy crude and the U.S. benchmark as well as to provide job and economic growth and boost tax revenue. Harper has referred to Canada as an emerging energy superpower because it has the world’s third-largest oil reserves, and as output from the oil sands is projected to double over the next decade. Further delays on pipeline projects may set back Canada’s ability to capture rising demand for fossil fuel and condemn its producers to lower prices. Proposed pipelines currently being reviewed by regulators who will probably make decisions on approval or rejection in 2014 and 2015 include Enbridge Inc.’s C$6 billion ($5.7 billion) Northern Gateway and its Line 9B reversal; TransCanada Corp.’s C$5.4 billion Keystone XL and C$12 billion Energy East projects, as well as Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain expansion. Some of these projects are already delayed. TransCanada was originally planning to have Keystone XL online in 2012 while Enbridge had forecast a decision on Northern Gateway by the end of 2012 and to get it up and running by 2017. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 28, 2013. China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. warned authorities in China two years ago that urbanization was hampering repair work on a crude oil pipeline in the eastern city of Qingdao. A blast last week at the pipe killed 55 people. The pipeline had “several safety hazards,” Beijing-based Sinopec, as the company is known, said in a September 2011 report, submitted to the Environmental Protection Bureau in Weifang, a city near Qingdao. The report describes the 27-year-old pipeline as originally built in a sparsely populated suburb, now crowded by construction and a rising population. Qingdao is home to 7.66 million people. Sinopec stopped 306 cases, including building projects, that illegally interfered with its nationwide pipeline operations in the first nine months, one of the company’s pipeline units said in an October report. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 27, 2013. Beneath the rolling pastures and woodland of western Pennsylvania, a corner of Appalachia dotted with Victorian main streets and white church steeples, a radical shift is under way. In Punxsutawney, home to a groundhog named Phil who prognosticates the weather each February, a $2.8 million hotel is under construction. A few miles away in DuBois, metal fabricator Staar Distributing LLC is expanding to neighboring Brookville. All this development is coming to an economically depressed region that lies atop the Marcellus shale, a rock formation that produces more natural gas than Saudi Arabia. Output from shale deposits including the Marcellus has surged 10-fold since 2005 to account for a third of the country’s gas production, government data show. The boom has eliminated a regional price premium, redirected pipeline flows and left the nation poised to export the fuel overseas after cutting imports by 44 percent since 2007. It’s also helped make the U.S. 86 percent energy independent, the most since 1986. “The Marcellus is a Goliath,” David Schlosser, senior vice president for engineering and strategic planning at EQT Corp., one of the four largest gas producers in the Marcellus, said. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 27, 2013. Record Asian oil demand is spurring the region’s refineries to charter the most supertankers in a year, driving shipping rates to the highest level since 2010. Traders hired enough carriers in the spot market from owners including Frontline Ltd. and Mitsui O.S.K. Lines Ltd. to load 35.9 million metric tons in the four weeks ended Nov. 24. The shipments expanded 53 percent since the end of August, during which time a glut of shipping capacity in the Persian Gulf shrank by about the same amount. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 27, 2013. Crude traders are skeptical that the accord loosening some economic sanctions against Iran in return for limiting nuclear work will lead to a surge in oil supply from what was once OPEC’s second-biggest producer. Brent, the benchmark for half the world’s crude, ended at $110.88 a barrel in London, little changed from where it was before the agreement was reached Nov. 24. While oil fell as much as 2.7 percent the next day, futures erased the decline by the end of the trading session. The six-month agreement capped the country’s crude exports at 1 million barrels a day. Until the U.S. removes all oil sanctions, markets are unlikely to slump. American authorities say Iranian crude sales are down 60 percent from when petroleum restrictions began in late 2011. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 2, 2013. A former BP Plc engineer accused of destroying evidence sought by the U.S. for a probe of the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill went on trial in the first criminal case arising from the disaster to go before a jury. U.S. prosecutors charged Kurt Mix with two counts of obstruction of justice last year, alleging he deleted from his mobile phone text messages and voice mails related to the company’s effort to estimate the size of the spill. Mix has pleaded not guilty. Jury selection started for his trial in federal court in New Orleans. The blowout of BP’s deep-water Macondo well off the coast of Louisiana in April 2010 killed 11 people and set off the largest offshore oil spill in U.S. history. Prosecutors allege Mix destroyed material sought for a federal probe of the disaster. Mix denies any intentional destruction of evidence. The company pleaded guilty to 14 criminal counts including 11 for felony manslaughter, one misdemeanor count under the Clean Water Act, one misdemeanor count under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act and one felony count of obstruction of Congress for misrepresenting the size of the spill. Transocean pleaded guilty in February to one misdemeanor count of violating the U.S. Clean Water Act and agreed to pay a $400 million criminal fine. Halliburton agreed in July to plead guilty to a misdemeanor for failing after the explosion to preserve computer models examining the final cement job on the well. The company paid a statutory maximum fine of $200,000. Mix was a senior BP engineer involved in leading efforts to cap the Macondo well as it gushed into the Gulf of Mexico, including a procedure called Top Kill, the U.S. said in court papers. Mix had access to internal BP data on the amount of oil flowing into the Gulf of Mexico from the well. Mix knew that BP’s internal estimates of the flow rate were “well above” the numbers the company was citing publicly and the maximum 15,000 barrel-a-day limit for Top Kill to be successful, the U.S. said. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 2, 2013. Even with OPEC forecast to keep its output quota unchanged at a meeting, falling oil demand and prospects for increased supply from some member states mean the group’s leader, Saudi Arabia, will have to cut production anyway.

The kingdom and its allies Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates will need to produce about 2 million barrels a day less in 2014 to prevent a glut, the Centre for Global Energy Studies predicts. That’s equal to annual revenue of about $80 billion at today’s prices. OPEC will reaffirm its collective limit of 30 million barrels a day, according to 22 of 24 analysts and traders surveyed. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 1, 2013. Iran plans to attract $70 billion for investments in its oil and gas industry. The oil ministry has prepared a roadmap for investment in the oil and gas industry for the next eight years. The main priority will be placed on completing the projects in joint oil and gas fields, especially the development of the South Pars gas field which is shared with Qatar. Expansion of petrochemical units and refineries will be the second priority. Iran has begun talks with the potential investors in its energy industry, which may help western oil giants move back into the country. (www.sify.com)

November 30, 2013. US President Barack Obama said there was sufficient supply of oil for countries like India and China to continue to reduce import of oil from Iran. The determination from Obama means countries like India would have to continue to painfully reduce their oil import from Iran or else it faces the prospects of being slapped with sanctions by the US. To avoid such a sanction, India and other countries would need to reduce their oil imports from Iran and thus get exemption from Secretary of State John Kerry. India has been receiving such an exemption from the Secretary of State. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)

November 30, 2013. Petroleo Brasileiro SA is increasing fuel prices as the world’s most indebted oil producer seeks to eliminate the gap between local and global values to help bolster profit. An 8 percent increase for diesel and a 4 percent boost for gasoline aim to “make prices in Brazil converge with the international benchmarks, within a compatible period,” the Rio de Janeiro-based company known as Petrobras, said. The increase also seeks to “assure that debt and leverage rates return within 24 months to the limits established by the 2013-2017 Business Plan”. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 28, 2013. Scotland’s independence referendum next year is hindering the plans of North Sea oil companies by clouding the outlook for taxes, fiscal policy, regulation and bank finance, according to a survey of industry executives. Industry officials were mostly troubled over personal and corporate taxes, followed by issues such as European Union membership, according to the survey by the Aberdeen & Grampian Chamber of Commerce, business lobby of the U.K.’s main oil hub. North Sea income is critical for the nationalists’ argument that Scotland would be better off going it alone as they seek to overturn a deficit of almost 20 percentage points in support for independence in recent polls. U.K. Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond, a former oil economist, contends the industry is on the cusp of an upturn that will strengthen Scotland’s finances. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 28, 2013. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) will bolster crude shipments through to mid-December, driven by Iraq and as refiners come out of maintenance, according to tanker tracker Oil Movements.

OPEC, which supplies about 40 percent of the world’s oil, will raise sailings by 700,000 barrels a day, or 3 percent, to 24.05 million barrels in the four weeks to Dec. 14, the researcher said in a report. That compares with 23.35 million in the period to Nov. 16. The figures exclude two of OPEC’s 12 members, Angola and Ecuador. (www.bloomberg.com)

POWER

December 1, 2013. IC Power has won a government tender worth $1 billion over 20 years to build a power plant in Peru that will provide reserves for the national power grid, IC Power's parent company Israel Corp said. Current power consumption in Peru is 5,500 MW and the new plant will provide an additional 590 MW, Israel Corp said. IC Power is involved in producing some 35 percent of Peru's electricity, the company said.

Under the deal, IC Power will build the plant in Mollendo, a town in southern Peru, by 2016. In the first stage, it will produce 590 MW via diesel. In the second stage, once gas capacity in Peru grows, it plans to sell the electricity to the private sector. IC Power is in the middle of a hydro-electric project in Peru set to be completed in 2016 and has already invested $350 million. The plant's planned output is 520 MW. Israel Corp, through IC Power, also owns 21 percent of Edegel, Peru's largest power generator. (blouinnews.com)

December 1, 2013. Iran has plans to produce more electricity by building a second nuclear energy plant in the country's Bushehr province where the first plant was built, said Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. Iran's Atomic Energy Organisation chief Ali Akbar Salehi said his country would start building its second nuclear power plant in near future in cooperation with Russia.

Iran's first nuclear power plant, the Bushehr plant, was first constructed in 1975 by several German companies. However, the work was halted when the US imposed an embargo on hi-tech supplies to Iran after the 1979 revolution. Russia signed a contract with Iran to complete the construction in 1998. (www.business-standard.com)

November 29, 2013. The biggest changes to Europe’s energy market since it was liberalized in the 1990s probably will miss a third deadline, traders and analysts said as the second target date passed. Network and exchange operators likely won’t meet the Feb. 4 goal to join up day-ahead power trading in 15 nations from the U.K. to Finland, according to eight of 12 traders and analysts surveyed after the Nov. 26 deadline passed. Integrating electricity trading in the 28-nation European Union, known as market coupling, is intended to increase competition by allowing power to flow more easily across borders to markets where prices are higher. The European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, estimates the annual savings for consumers at as much as 4 billion euros ($5 billion). (www.bloomberg.com)

December 2, 2013. U.K. power companies announced they will cut prices for consumers after Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne pledged to scale back government green levies to ease the cost of living. Prime Minister David Cameron and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg promised to will cut the average energy bill by about 50 pounds ($82) per year by funding some of the costs currently included in energy bills. Centrica Plc, the largest supplier to U.K. households, and SSE Plc said they would cut bills by an average of about 50 pounds a year in response to the government’s announcement.

NPower, the U.K. unit of Germany’s RWE AG, said it would keep bills stable until 2015, barring a significant increase in the cost of wholesale electricity. Ed Davey, energy minister said that the government will invest 500 million pounds in energy efficiency. Cameron and Clegg said the government would provide as much as 1,000 pounds to new homeowners to spend on energy-saving measures. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 2, 2013. Saudi Arabia plans to spend $29 billion on water and power projects. The projects include ventures with Egyptian Electricity Co. to increase power generation in Saudi Arabia. Demand for electricity and potable water is growing in the desert kingdom as industries expand. The country expects to complete the world’s largest desalination plant by 2018 in Rabigh on the Red Sea coast, which will be able to pump 600,000 cubic meters (158 million gallons) of potable water a day. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 27, 2013. Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif announced that his country will build six civil nuclear power plants. Sharif said the country’s Atomic Energy Commission has identified six sites where civil nuclear power plants could be built.

According to the prime minister, Pakistan would produce 40,000 MW of power from nuclear plants till 2050 and the government’s priority was to start work on power projects to overcome the energy shortage. Sharif launched the construction of the country’s biggest atomic power plant and vowed to pursue further projects to make nuclear the largest energy source. The 2,200 MW plant is to be built with Chinese technical assistance on the Arabian Sea coast at Paradise Beach, 40 km (25 miles) west of Karachi. (www.arabnews.com)

December 1, 2013. Poor financial health of power distribution companies and funding issues pose challenges to India's plan of having 20,000 MW solar energy capacity by 2022, according to the government. The ambitious Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission, launched in 2010, has set a target 20,000 MW installed solar power capacity by 2022. The poor financial position of state electricity boards is a matter of concern for project developers even though the government has introduced debt restructuring package for distressed power distribution companies (discoms). According to Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), the lack of transmission network to evacuate solar power is a major hurdle. Nevertheless, the government is making efforts to develop the solar energy segment. Plans are on the anvil for setting up ultra mega solar projects (UMPPs), having capacity of about 4,000 MW, in different parts of the country. The MNRE has proposed solar UMPPs in Rajasthan and Gujarat, besides plans for large solar parks in Ladakh and Kargil. Ground work has already commenced for the country's first solar UMPP in Rajasthan. It would be developed by a joint venture -- Bhel (26%), Solar Energy Corp (23%), Power Grid Corp, Satluj Jal Vidyut Nigam and Hindustan Salts (16% each) and Rajasthan Electronics and Instruments (REIL) (3%). In this project, the first phase of 1,000 MW is expected to be completed in three years. Going by estimates, the operational solar power capacity, comprising solar photo voltaic and solar thermal, is currently at little over 2,000 MW. India has an overall installed power generation capacity of more than 2,27,000 MW, with renewable sources accounting for over 28,000 MW. (www.business-standard.com)

November 29, 2013. Reliance Power said it is on track to commission a 100 MW solar project in Rajasthan's Jaisalmer district by March next year. The project is the world's largest Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) project based on CLFR technology. The 100 MW CSP plant is being built at a cost of ` 2,100 crores and is located adjacent to the 40 MW solar photovoltaic project commissioned by the company. Rajasthan Sun Technique Energy Pvt Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Reliance Power, had won the CSP project in December 2010 in an international competitive bidding conducted by NTPC Vidyut Vyapar Nigam Ltd (a subsidiary of NTPC) under the prestigious Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission. (www.business-standard.com)

November 28, 2013. Wind turbine major Suzlon Group said it has signed a contract with Mitsui & Co for setting up 106.6 MW windfarm in Australia. The turbines, which will be delivered in 2014 and commissioned in 2015, are expected to produce up to 3,80,000 MWh (megawatt-hour) of electricity per year, enough to power over 62,000 homes. (profit.ndtv.com)

November 28, 2013. Demand for renewable-energy credits in India doubled in November as regulators enforce clean-power targets for companies and state-run utilities. There were 308,928 bids to buy wind, hydro and biomass credits, after 150,640 the previous month, according to data from trader REConnect Energy Solutions Pvt. The government requires electricity distributors and large industrial companies such as Coal India Ltd. and Tata Power Co. to get as much as 10 percent of their energy from renewables. Those unable to source enough locally must comply with the regulation by purchasing credits from clean-power plants. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 3, 2013. European Union (EU) countries approved a deal with China to curb imports of Chinese solar panels, bringing to an end the EU’s biggest trade dispute of its kind. EU governments endorsed an agreement struck by their trade chief and China in July that sets a minimum price and a volume limit on European imports of Chinese solar panels until the end of 2015. Participating Chinese manufacturers will be spared EU tariffs meant to counter alleged below-cost sales, a practice known as dumping, and subsidies. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 3, 2013. Hitachi Ltd. unveiled an energy-storage system that the company said will support wind and solar power and allow users to sell electricity into deregulated markets such as California. The units can be installed on high-voltage power lines, and will be able to capture excess energy produced by wind and solar sources so it can be sold back into the network when the demand for power exceeds the supply. The systems, which include telecommunications and lithium-ion battery technologies developed by Tokyo-based Hitachi, will also minimize volatility on the power grid. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 3, 2013. Keystone XL will be a “major driver” of oil sands expansion that significantly raises the risks of climate change, said Tom Steyer, a former hedge fund manager who has spent some of his fortune fighting the pipeline. Steyer spoke at a Washington conference that his group, NextGen Climate Action, sponsored to respond to President Barack Obama’s declaration that he wouldn’t approve Keystone if it were found to lead to a major increase in carbon-dioxide emissions. The summit was held at the same Georgetown University campus where Obama laid down his climate marker in a June speech. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 2, 2013. Brazil, the world’s largest producer of ethanol from sugarcane, may start producing the biofuel from corn after a record crop prompted domestic prices to slump below costs. Corn prices have fallen as Brazil’s output has more than doubled in 11 years. The nation’s yield reached 81 million metric tons in 2012-13 as farmers started planting two crops per season and used new technologies and more fertilizer, data from the country’s Ministry of Agriculture show. Output is expected to drop to as much as 79.8 million tons in 2013-14 after prices fell, the ministry said. Corn in the main state of Mato Grosso dropped 37 percent this year to 11.26 reais a 60-kilo bag ($2.04 a bushel), below the production cost of 13.02 reais, data from the government show. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 2, 2013. Australia’s newly elected leaders, claiming a mandate to dump the old government’s climate policies, would actually protect programs the defeated Labor party was using to prepare for emissions trading. Environment Minister Greg Hunt is working to shield the agencies that monitor and regulate greenhouse gases from cuts proposed for other climate units, according to a policy paper he issued. The outline reaffirms a pledge to pare Australia’s emissions by 2020 and calls for a “carbon buy-back fund” that might include penalties as well as credits based on industry targets, Hunt said. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 2, 2013. The U.K. should prioritize measures that curb energy waste and introduce a target to cut subsidies to the fossil fuel industry, a panel of lawmakers said. The government in its Autumn Statement on Dec. 5 should show how it calculates energy subsidies to provide transparency for a debate on their role in the U.K., the Environmental Audit Committee said in a report. It also should clarify how changes to green levies will affect energy costs for poor people, it said. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 2, 2013. Japan’s domestic shipments of solar cells and modules rose more than threefold in the fiscal second quarter amid a push to expand energy supplies. Local shipments totaled 2,075 MW in the three months ended Sept. 30, compared with 627 MW in the same quarter last year, according to the Japan Photovoltaic Energy Association. Exports fell to 53 MW from 153 MW a year ago. Japanese suppliers accounted for 72 percent of all modules shipped in Japan, including 628 MW produced at plants outside the country, the association said. (www.bloomberg.com)

December 2, 2013. Modern Water Plc, which completed the world’s first commercial forward-osmosis desalination plant in Oman last year, won three contracts in China during a U.K. trade mission led by Prime Minister David Cameron. The deals are “milestones for Modern Water’s work in China” the past five years that has targeted water shortages, energy efficiency and environmental protection, the Guildford, England-based company said. No terms were given. A Beijing signing ceremony included the outlines of a three-way deal with Ottomen Estate Resources and Hangzhou Water for a 500 cubic meter a day forward-osmosis desalination plant on Xugong Island that would be the first in China. Hangzhou Water is China’s largest desalination equipment company. Modern Water supplies advanced systems for water monitoring and treatment. It’s attempted to coax more companies to a membrane-based forward-osmosis technology that offers lower energy consumption for contaminated waters than rival reverse-osmosis water purifiers increasingly in demand in water-stressed regions including the Middle East. The agreements follow China’s latest Five-Year Plan that “identified the need for a large increase in desalination capacity to help better control water shortages and improve environmental protection,” Modern Water said. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 29, 2013. Operators of a wind farm in waters off Fukushima prefecture, site of the March 2011 nuclear disaster, aim to cut the cost of setting up the floating turbines by half as they push to commercialize the technology. The pilot project, funded by the government and led by trading house Marubeni Corp., began operations with a 2 MW turbine connected to a substation. Both are about 20 kilometers (12 miles) off the coast of Fukushima. The project’s second phase will see the installation of two more turbines from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. with 7 MW capacity each. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 29, 2013. Pawel Mikusek, spokesman on climate protection for the Polish government, comments on the prospects for tighter emission restrictions in the European Union. United Nations climate envoys decided a year ago in Doha that richer nations party to the 1997 Kyoto Protocol would revisit emission limits for the eight years though 2020 in 2014. Envoys are seeking to extend the protocol to limit emissions by 37 industrialized nations. Negotiators also aim to strike a separate global climate deal by 2015 that would bring in developing and emerging nations for implementation from 2020. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 29, 2013. Beijing opened the third of seven carbon exchanges planned in China, with first trades in the capital fetching higher prices than debuts in Shenzhen and Shanghai. Five trades covering a total of 40,800 metric tons carbon emission quotas were completed at prices ranging from 50 yuan ($8.21) to 51.25 yuan a ton on the first day at the Beijing Environment Exchange, it said. Beijing has agreed to study the possibility of “inter-regional emissions trading” with the city of Tianjin and the provinces of Hebei, Shanxi, Inner Mongolia and Shandong, the exchange said. China selected seven cities and provinces to set regional caps and pilot programs for trading emission rights as part of its initiative to cut the intensity of emissions by as much as 45 percent before 2020 from 2005 levels. The Chinese government has said the pilot exchanges are a precursor to a national trading system as soon as 2016. China joined India at this month’s climate talks in Warsaw in resisting longer-term commitments until the U.S. and Europe agree to a heavier burden. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 28, 2013. Bulgaria's budget commission has proposed imposing a 20 percent fee on revenue from wind and solar power installations next year to help it finance incentives for the sector while trying to keep electricity costs down. The committee included the proposal from the nationalist Attack party to levy the fee on wind and solar energy producers quarterly as part of the 2014 budget law, which is pending final approval in the chamber. (www.reuters.com)

November 27, 2013. International Finance Corp. (IFC), a unit of the World Bank, led a group of lenders providing $221 million for a wind farm in Jordan as the nation adds more clean energy. The 117 MW project will be built by Jordan Wind Project Co. in Tafila in the country’s southwest, the IFC said. The Washington-based investor provided $69 million of the total, while the European Investment Bank and Eksport Kredit Fonden also contributed. Jordan has a target to get 10 percent of its electricity from renewables by the end of the decade, up from about 1 percent now. The country’s energy import bill has soared because of repeated attacks on Egypt’s gas-pipeline network, prompting a shift in power generation to diesel and an increase in investment in solar, wind and other sources. The wind farm will be able to generate electricity at a price that’s about 25 percent less than that for thermal power, according to the IFC. Demand for power in the desert kingdom is increasing as much as 8 percent a year, it said. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 27, 2013. Climate negotiators’ failure to set emission-limiting rules for the Kyoto Protocol’s extension through 2020 was down to one paragraph on Ukraine’s greenhouse-gas targets, according to the European Union. Envoys meeting at the United Nations climate talks in Warsaw couldn’t agree on article “3.7ter,” a paragraph in the Kyoto rules that sets the limit on countries’ emissions. Negotiators have given themselves another seven months to reach agreement, according to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the EU. (www.bloomberg.com)

November 27, 2013. Kenya suspended issuing new licenses for wind farms and solar plants until 2017 as it prioritizes development of cheaper fuel-based sources to help cut electricity prices, Energy Secretary Davis Chirchir said. The East African government plans to add at least 5,500 MW of power supply in the 40 months from September, almost tripling output from current installed capacity of 1,700 MW mainly from rain-fed hydropower plants. About 80 percent of that additional capacity will be tapped from coal-, liquefied natural gas-, and geothermal-powered facilities, Chirchir said. Wind and power generation will account for a maximum of 15 percent of new supplies and projects already under way have filled that quota. Hydropower and diesel-fired sources will comprise the remainder, he said. (www.bloomberg.com)

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