Domestic Energy Corp., an independent oil and gas exploration and development firm, announced here it plans to become one of the early participants in the new Chattanooga Shale natural gas development in Tennessee.

“Domestic Energy has people in the gas fields of Tennessee today, launching its bid to become one of the large independents operating in the state,” said Larry Hillabrandt, President, Domestic Energy Corp.

“We will initially focus on acquiring existing wells and shale leases, then begin the construction of a gas gathering system and finally putting the newly acquired and drilled wells into production for oil and gas,” he added. Read more » »

North Dakota’s own estimate of how much oil can be gotten economically, using current technology, from the Bakken formation in the Williston Basin is slightly above or below 2.1 billion barrels, Lynn Helms reported this morning at a conference here.

Helms, director of the state’s department of mineral resources, said that estimate is based on a new study by the state that estimates there is as much total oil, or “oil in place,” in the Bakken formation as some of the largest estimates. Read more » »

A Lagos based Oil Company Antoniooil has paid N150.000 for the operation of 9 year old Rukaiya suffering post burn contractures and currently awaiting operations at the Dala orthopedic hospital Kano.

The oil company had responded to a publication on her appeal in Sunday Trust when her parents asked for assistance.

Handing over the N150.000.00 cash to the officials of the hospital head of the human resources department and personal assistant to the Managing Director of the company, Mr Ocholi Joseph said the decision to pay the bills was based on their social responsibility to the public.
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Australia said no Chinese companies have been told to withdraw applications to buy into Australian resource firms, despite media reports Canberra was pressuring China to back away from such investment.

China’s miners and steelmakers are looking to buy mining assets in Australia to lock in supplies of raw materials such as coal and iron ore to fuel an expected construction boom lasting decades and to ease reliance on resource sector heavyweights BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto.
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PRIME Minister Kevin Rudd says bringing the budget together is “tough as all hell”, but economists say the Federal Government will soon be wallowing in billions of extra dollars from the mining boom.

Economists estimate increased contract prices for coal and iron ore could rake in an additional $10 to $12 billion from company tax receipts, suggesting the Government will easily surpass its target surplus in next month’s budget.
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THE rapid multi-billion-dollar expansion of Australia’s second-biggest commodity export, liquefied natural gas, could stall if new investors are forced to comply with an emissions trading scheme from 2010.

The warning comes as major emitters continue to lobby for a regulated and cautious start to emissions trading in Australia, saying the credibility of the scheme could be destroyed if prices are allowed to skyrocket when trading begins.

Australia’s booming $15billion a year LNG export industry has plans to triple output by 2017, which would see it eclipse coal as Australia’s biggest commodity export.
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Russia’s largest diversified industrial group, Basel, has expanded into the coal business, purchasing East Siberian production sites with a yearly output of 9.5 million tonnes, a company official said on Monday.

The official for Basel’s EnPlus energy subsidiary told Reuters that EnPlus’ subsidiary EuroSibEnergo bought coal producer VostSibUgol in the East Siberian region of Irkutsk from Russia’s largest coal producer SUEK.
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AFTER years of frustration for the industry from infrastructure bottlenecks, exacerbated by recent heavy rains, coal companies are beginning to position themselves for the next export and mine development boom.

Mines and Energy Minister Geoff Wilson told Parliament last week there were 28 advanced coal projects in Central Queensland alone.

“Seventeen are new mines”, the minister said, “and 11 are expansions of existing mines.

“Over the next five years, potential capital investment in coalmine projects in central Queensland is estimated at $11.5 billion, with a further $9 billion on coal transport infrastructure.
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A North Sea pipeline which supplies around 40 percent of Britain’s oil and gas as well as international markets will shut down within hours because of a strike, operator BP said Saturday.

The Forties pipeline in Grangemouth, west of Edinburgh, Scotland, is being closed as a knock-on effect of industrial action by 1,200 workers at a neighbouring oil refinery in a row over pensions.

It is the first time in more than 70 years that a British refinery is being closed by a strike.

The pipeline cannot function without electricity and steam generated by the refinery, which has already closed ahead of the strike Sunday and Monday.
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Indonesia’s state-run power firm PLN has signed two engineering procurement contracts worth $888.4 million with Chinese companies for construction of coal-fired power plants, a news report said on Saturday.

The first contract worth $642 million was signed Friday for the 700-Megawatt Tanjugn Awar-Awar plant in East Java, with a consortium of China National Machinery Equipment Corp. (Sinomac), China National Electric Equipment (CNEEC) and local firm PT Penta Adi Samudra.
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