Energy Blast – Aug 9, 2011

Kaliningrad authorities will not permit a regional referendum on the construction of a nuclear power plant ‘because nuclear policy is the prerogative of the federal government’.  BP has launched a court case in Stockholm against Renova, one of its TNK-BP shareholders, claiming that Renova is in violation of an existing shareholders agreement for operating independent gas firms in Russia and Ukraine.  The Trans-Adriatic Pipeline consortium, which aims to take gas from the Caspian into Europe, may double its investment in Greece to over €1 billion.  Tokyo Electric Power, which operates the Fukushima Daiichi plant where disaster struck earlier this year, has reported a $7.4 billion first-quarter loss.  Germany’s RWE took a 40% profit hit for 2011, ‘driven mainly by additional costs related to the country’s decision to phase out nuclear power and tax nuclear fuel’.  On the positive energy prospects facing Kurdistan.