Energy Blast – Oct 23, 2010

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has ordered Transneft – which will not be included in the state’s privatization drive – to improve transparency and disclose information about its pricing policy and investment programs, apparently in response to dissatisfaction with the company’s ‘habit of increasing tariffs to cover project costs‘.  Investors are concerned about Novorossiysk Commercial Sea Port, as it seeks to approve a $1.95 billion loan to help it purchase the Baltic Sea’s Primorsk Port which is ‘25 percent above the valuation for its global peers‘.  Russia and Turkmenistan will wait for demand to recover before reviving what Reuters calls their ‘mothballed Caspian gas pipeline‘.  Japan’s JOGMEC and the Irkutsk Gas Company plan to jointly invest $300 million to develop three sites in the Russian region, expecting results in 3-4 years.  Murmansk’s nuclear-powered icebreaker has safely completed a three-week voyage.