[armaggedon51]

Look like the information is very well controlled. There is a no flight/no boat zone around the platform. That will be very difficult to have independent reporters access information. We will be at the mercy of Total on what's going on.

[tubaplayer]

I have seen nothing on the Beeb (BBC) about this and that worries me

[dorlomin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Repent', 'H')ere we go people, the deepwater horizon disaster part II -!

[Cog]

Gas explosions tend to be fairly spectacular.

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('tubaplayer', 'I') have seen nothing on the Beeb (BBC) about this and that worries me

[rockdoc123]

Some factual information as I've been able to glean out of what is the most reliable source in this sort of thing....investment bankers who stand to win/lose millions based on what might transpire:

- The well that had the surface blowout has essentially played itself out and was in the process of being abandoned. During the abandonment operation there was a sudden influx of gas into the mud which was in the wellbore. That gas would have lowered the effective density of the mud creating the environment for a blowout.
- The wellhead is still in place as opposed to the situation at Macondo. This means a top kill intervention (if that is what they decide to do in order to kill the well) should be relatively simple if they can figure out where the surface leak is coming from.
- Not enough information to indicate the abandonment operation. If they had the BOP stack in place while circulating it is surprising that the well couldn't have been shutin. The thought is that a seal on the wellhead failed which has allowed for gas to leak at the seafloor.
- The flarestack is a common safety item during this type of operation which allows the operator to flow excess gas away from the wellhead.
- It appears the flare size has been decreasing which suggests the well pressure is decreasing. Total has said they belief the well will kill itself. This reasoning is based on the fact they had already produced the well to a point at abandonment pressure. That is generally the pressure which is needed to lift the gas to surface. They are likely thinking the gas that came into the well bore is from an isolated zone of limited extent.
- there is no evidence of H2S in the gas leak according to Total. Natural gas in the North Sea is generally free of H2S from what I can remember.
- one of the main differences between this and Macondo is Macondo was an underground blowout of oil with high quantities of gas in it that came from a virgin slightly overpressured reservoir. The Elgin blowout is from a depleted reservoir that is gas with some minor amount of associated liquids. There is much less chance of an environmental disaster in the latter case. The biggest danger (in my opinion) for Elgin is if enough gas were to leak at the wellhead and currents aren't strong then the water loses it's bouancy and it might create stability problems for facilities on site.
Total hasn't said much simply because they are trying to assess the situation. There is a rig in the immediate area that they are currently using to drill development wells that can be moved to this site quickly which means intervention could happen in fairly short order.

[rockdoc123]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'N')uke the rest of Scotland while your at it !!!!!!!!!

[dorlomin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('rockdoc123', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'N')uke the rest of Scotland while your at it !!!!!!!!!

[Outcast_Searcher]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('rockdoc123', 'T')here is a rig in the immediate area that they are currently using to drill development wells that can be moved to this site quickly which means intervention could happen in fairly short order.

[rockdoc123]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I') really hope TOTAL gets lucky here and that this thing seals itself off as you predict. That, however, does NOT equate to all being OK with the safety of hydrocarbon production in general. It seems like the accident frequency is increasing.

[Graeme]

German Bank Won’t Finance Arctic Ocean Drilling, Saying The ‘Risks And Costs Are Simply Too High’

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')n another stark warning about the dangers of Arctic Ocean drilling, the German bank WestLB announced on Friday that it would not provide financing to any offshore oil or gas drilling in the region. The company’s sustainability manager said the “risks and costs are simply too high.”

The decision was made just a week after insurance giant Lloyd’s of London issued a report concluding that offshore drilling in the Arctic would “constitute a unique and hard-to-manage risk” and urged companies to “think carefully about the consequences of action” before exploring for oil in the region.
Dustin Neuneyer, sustainability manager at the corporate and investment bank WestLB, explained the decision to Environmental Finance:

“The further you get into the icy regions, the more expensive everything gets and there are risks that are hard to manage.… There are projects that are evidently unsustainable in an encompassing sense. For WestLB, the risks and costs are simply too high.”

The bank’s new eight-point policy on offshore drilling lays out specific criteria for the projects and companies that are eligible for financing — excluding any exploration or production activities in areas where the average temperature for the warmest month is below 10°C (50° F). Additionally, the policy’s criteria — which are binding for any company seeking a loan — require companies to use the best available technology, abide by the highest technical safety standards, and show that activities are validated by an independent third party.

[Daniel_Plainview]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Graeme', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he bank’s new eight-point policy on offshore drilling lays out specific criteria for the projects and companies that are eligible for financing — excluding any exploration or production activities in areas where the average temperature for the warmest month is below 10°C (50° F).

[Graeme]

Exxon Mobil profits hit by lower oil production

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he amount of oil the Texas-based company produced in the first three months of the year dropped 7.7pc compared with a year earlier. Oil prices, meanwhile, averaged 12pc higher in the quarter as hopes for the global economy strengthened and tensions over Iran's nuclear programme escalated.
The decline contributed to an 11pc drop in Exxon's overall profits in the quarter to $9.45bn (£5.8bn). That fell short of Wall Street's expectations and helped send the shares down 1.7pc to $85.35 in early afternoon trading.

Analysts said that the drop in production underlined the challenge the world's biggest energy companies face in tapping new reserves of oil to meet rising global demand. Rex Tillerson, Exxon's chairman and chief executive, said that the company is working on several new fields that will drive production up by between 1pc and 2pc a year over the next four years. Last year Exxon struck a $3.2bn deal with Russia's Rosneft that will allow the US company to drill for oil in the Arctic Ocean.

However, the bigger headache for Exxon is the sharp drop in natural gas prices. Exxon was one of the first companies to make a big bet that natural gas will play a central role in meeting America's energy needs when it paid $41bn for rival producer XTO Energy in 2009. A glut of production and investment in the country's natural gas fields since then has helped drive prices to the lowest in 10 years. They dropped 40pc in the first quarter.

[Graeme]

Same gas, different results for Exxon and Shell

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'N')atural gas figures large in these two oil majors' long-term strategies and it also loomed over their first-quarter results released yesterday. The similarities ended there however.

Shell expects 2012 to be the first year its gas output consistently exceeds that of oil. Earnings from its gas business more than doubled in the first quarter, helping the company beat the consensus forecast overall. Contrast that with Exxon, which missed expectations mainly because of weaker upstream numbers that include profits from gas output.

In the global gas game, location is critical. With US gas prices moribund, Exxon's big bet on the fuel via 2010's purchase of XTO Energy still drags on profits. Gas sold in Europe and Asia fetches much higher prices. In the first quarter, only 5 percent of Shell's output was US gas compared with 14 percent for Exxon.

[dissident]

Maybe the management of Exxon can spend a few more million funding global warming deniers and then their profits will go back up.

[BobInget]

XOM's big bet on NG (the other liquid fuel hydrocarbon) by buying XTO, will pay off in good time.
This BTW, is not the first Exxon slippage in production. Despite what management may say publicly about 'peak oil', actions speak louder.
Perhaps a few readers here are unaware, Shell Oil is also looking to NG to save their chili.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_to_liquids
http://marcellusdrilling.com/2011/12/sh ... ids-plant/

<<Shell is moving into natural gas in a major way. In fact, natural gas will eclipse crude oil for Shell sometime next year by being more than 50 percent of Shell’s global production. Shell has committed to spending $2 billion to build an ethane cracker plant in the Marcellus region of the U.S., and now they are talking about building a gas-to-liquids plant. Shell invested an astonishing $19 billion in a gas-to-liquids plant in Qatar. Imagine that investment coming to the U.S.! Such is the transformative power of shale gas.>>

Getting back to Exxon: This from the WSJ; http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142 ... 29260.html

Like it or not folks, coal & oil giants are not about to give up on hydrocarbons.

Now, for some real PO news: 'will Canada continue to import Brent priced crude into their Atlantic Provinces, while selling oil in western Canada for discounts as high as $20. per Bbbl (off WTI) to the US?'
That BTW, often comes to a $40 USD price differential!
I happen to know the answer. It's NO. By this time next year, at least half of Canada's oil sands production will be diverted from export to the US and end up in Ontario and Quebec. It's called pipeline reversal. http://www.calgaryherald.com/business/e ... story.html
This should be good news for US enviromentalists that disdain those filthy tar sands.
Losing an additional million barrels of Canada's exports (by late 2013, 500,000 Bpd should be flowing west to Asia, another PL reversal.)
As with climate change, the safe thing to do is prepare for the worst. That is why 'big oil' is slowly converting to 'big gas'.
(full discloser, I have been buying oversold, dividend paying, shares in Canadian and US gasbags of late)

[BobInget]

XOM's big bet on NG (the other liquid fuel hydrocarbon) by buying XTO, will pay off in good time.
This BTW, is not the first Exxon slippage in production. Despite what management may say publicly about 'peak oil', actions speak louder.
Perhaps a few readers here are unaware, Shell Oil is also looking to NG to save their chili.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_to_liquids
http://marcellusdrilling.com/2011/12/sh ... ids-plant/

<<Shell is moving into natural gas in a major way. In fact, natural gas will eclipse crude oil for Shell sometime next year by being more than 50 percent of Shell’s global production. Shell has committed to spending $2 billion to build an ethane cracker plant in the Marcellus region of the U.S., and now they are talking about building a gas-to-liquids plant. Shell invested an astonishing $19 billion in a gas-to-liquids plant in Qatar. Imagine that investment coming to the U.S.! Such is the transformative power of shale gas.>>

Getting back to Exxon: This from the WSJ; http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142 ... 29260.html

Like it or not folks, coal & oil giants are not about to give up on hydrocarbons.

Now, for some real PO news: 'will Canada continue to import Brent priced crude into their Atlantic Provinces, while selling oil in western Canada for discounts as high as $20. per Bbbl (off WTI) to the US?'
That BTW, often comes to a $40 USD price differential!
I happen to know the answer. It's NO. By this time next year, at least half of Canada's oil sands production will be diverted from export to the US and end up in Ontario and Quebec. It's called pipeline reversal. http://www.calgaryherald.com/business/e ... story.html
This should be good news for US enviromentalists that disdain those filthy tar sands.
Losing an additional million barrels of Canada's exports (by late 2013, 500,000 Bpd should be flowing west to Asia, another PL reversal.)
As with climate change, the safe thing to do is prepare for the worst. That is why 'big oil' is slowly converting to 'big gas'.
(full discloser, I have been buying oversold, dividend paying, shares in Canadian and US gasbags of late)

[misterno]

What is the reason for lower oil production?

Technical or peak oil? Anybody knows?