LONDON, March 8 (Reuters) - Despite the overwhelmingly bullish sentiment that still dominates talk about oil prices, the rally that started at the end of June 2017 seems to have run out of momentum. Front-month Brent futures prices peaked in the final week of January and have since been on a gently declining trend. Brent calendar spreads peaked even earlier in January and have also been gently softening for nearly two months now. Prices and spreads are back to levels they first reached in the [Read more]
Heavy crude discount widens on supply buildup
The Canadian heavy oil discount widenedon Wednesday against the West Texas Intermediate (WTI)benchmark, as supplies continued to build amid tight transportcapacity.* Movement of crude is not expected to pick up significantlyuntil spring, when TransCanada Corp's Keystone pipelinemay be back up to full pressure after a November leak, and railcapacity may be more widely available, traders have said.* Recent ebbs and flows in the discount's range are theresult of a trickling of [Read more]
Australia’s Woodside drops Grassy Point LNG plan in Canada
Australia's Woodside Petroleum has dropped plans to build a liquefied natural gas export plant at Grassy Point on Canada's west coast,choosing to focus on another Canadian LNG project, Kitimat, run by Chevron Corp . Woodside's rights to develop the Grassy Point LNG site,about 30 km north of Prince Rupert, expired on Jan. 15, and the company said on Wednesday it had decided not to renew the agreement. "The decision was made after careful consideration of our long-term development strategy [Read more]
U.S. metals tariff would hurt future returns: shale company CEO
HOUSTON (Reuters) - Pioneer Natural Resources Co Chief Executive Tim Dove on Tuesday said proposed U.S. tariffs on imported steel and aluminum would negatively impact his shale oil production company’s profits. Dove’s remarks echoed several other energy executives who this week said they faced higher costs from tariffs, and said there are certain types of metal that are not made by U.S. companies. Pipeline and refining expansions could be revisited if the tariffs significantly raise [Read more]
Suncor’s Sarnia, Ontario refinery to undergo turnaround in April
Suncor Energy's refinery in Sarnia, Ontario is expected to undergo a turnaround in April, news website blackburnnews.com reported on Tuesday. Preparation work is underway and the company is now using its alternate flare to get the main flare ready for the turnaround, the report said, quoting a community alert notice by the company. The alternate flare is scheduled to be in use until late June, the report added. Suncor operates a 85,000 barrel-per-day (bpd) refinery inSarnia, Ontario, [Read more]
Heavy crude discount widens on bulging stockpiles
The Canadian heavy oil discount widenedon Monday against the West Texas Intermediate (WTI) benchmark,as bulging crude stockpiles in Alberta weighed on prices andreversed part of a recent narrowing of the price spread. * The discount had been shrinking modestly in the past weekdue to additional railway volumes. However, these shipments havenot meaningfully reduced the supply overhanging the market, aCalgary-based trader said.* Western Canada Select (WCS) heavy blend crude for Aprildelivery in [Read more]
Chevron in talks to sell stake in Canada LNG project
Chevron Corp is exploring options including the sale of a minority stake in its Canadian liquefied natural gas (LNG) project as it pushes ahead, three people familiar with the matter told Reuters. Among the parties in talks with Chevron for a possible stake in Kitimat LNG are Petroliam Nasional Bhd, or Petronas, which scrapped its own $36 billion LNG project in British Columbia last year due to challenging market conditions, two of the people said. Reuters spoke over the past week to the [Read more]
U.S. natural gas end-of-season storage forecasts
U.S. natural gas storage is expected to end theNovember-March withdrawal season at a below-normal 1.405 trillion cubic feet(tcf), according to analysts.That would be the lowest since the end of March in 2014 when stocks fellto 0.857 tcf and compares with an average of 1.720 tcf over the past fiveyears (2013-17) and 2.063 tcf at the end of the withdrawal season in 2017.The 385 active storage fields in the lower 48 states had a workingcapacity of 4.373 tcf in November 2016, according to federal [Read more]
IEA sees U.S. oil output surge stealing OPEC share in next five years
LONDON (Reuters) - U.S. shale oil output is set to surge over the next five years stealing market share from OPEC producers and moving the country, once the world’s top oil importer, closer to self sufficiency, the International Energy Agency said on Monday. A landmark deal in 2017 between OPEC and rivals including Russia to curb output to reduce global oversupply materially improved the outlook for other producers as prices rose sharply throughout the year, the IEA said in Oil 2018, an [Read more]
Global oil players flock to Houston as OPEC, U.S shale tensions ease
The oil industry's biggest names gather this week at CERAWeek, the largest energy industry get-together in the Americas, at a time when U.S. shale production is booming, global demand is rising and crude prices are at a sweet spot for both big U.S. producers and OPEC. Last year's decision by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries to restrain output has drained the global glut that occupied much of the conversation at 2017's gathering.With oil prices up about 15 percent since [Read more]