Energy Blast, Feb. 18, 2008

Rosneft, Russia’s largest oil producer, has announced plans to build several gas-fired power plants across the country before 2020 as part of an effort to recycle the country’s waste gas and protect the environment. An arm of Rosneft has filed a legal claim against power producer TGK-11, threatening to split the company. Rosneft President Sergei Bogdanchikov expects BP will retain its participation in the Sakhalin-4 and Sakhalin-5 projects, and believes joint development of Sakhalin-3 resources with Gazprom is a possibility. The new head of Transneft, the company managing the construction of an oil pipeline from East Siberia to the Pacific Ocean, is opposed to speeding up the project.

The governments of Ukraine and Russia could sign an energy agreement “to avoid the kind of gas disputes that have alarmed Europe over the past two years.”The Ethiopian government says it welcomes Russian oil and gas companies’ plans to develop deposits in Ethiopia. Lukoil in particular is seeking to develop oil and gas fields there.Gazprom Neft, the oil arm of Russian natural-gas producer Gazprom, plans to invest $720 million on associated gas projects.World EnergyVenezuela’s ambassador to the United States yesterday compared Exxon Mobil‘s strategy in a contract dispute to “the very discredited strategy of ‘preemptive war’ “. Separately, ENI, the Italian oil giant, said it had settled its year-old dispute over Venezuela’s seizure of the Dacion field.The Indian government says it does not expect the stock market volatility to affect the schedule of the forthcoming initial public offering of state-run Oil India Ltd.