Oil Timeline
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Gulf Region oil company
histories: http://www.virginia.edu/igpr/APAG/apagoilhistory.html
US Dept. of Energy Timeline: http://energy.gov/about/timeline1939-1950.htm
1815
Jul 9, The 1st US natural gas well was discovered.
(MC, 7/9/02)
1855 Organic chemist Benjamin
Stillman laid the foundations for the Pennsylvania oil rush by his
discovery that petroleum could be distilled into lubricants and
kerosene for cooking and illumination. Suddenly there was a use for the
crude oil that seeped to the surface, annoying farmers by ruining the
land and polluting the water supply.
(HNPD, 10/4/98)
1859 Aug 27-28, The US oil
business was born in Titusville, Pa. Former army officer Colonel Edwin
L. Drake drilled the first oil well in Titusville, Pa., striking oil at
70 feet and setting off a wild scramble for wealth similar to the
California gold rush of 1849. The land belonged to the Pennsylvania
Rock Oil Company. Until that time, the company had simply collected oil
that seeped out of the ground. Drake's plan was to produce it in large
quantities for use in heating and illumination. Overnight oil fields
sprang up in Pennsylvania but competition, disorganization and
oversupply kept oil prices low. It was not until John D. Rockefeller
and the Standard Oil Company came onto the scene in 1870 that the
petroleum industry developed into a vastly profitable, although much
hated, monopoly.
(HFA, '96, p.36)(AP, 8/27/97)(HNPD, 10/4/98)(WSJ,
10/4/96, p.A9)(HNQ, 2//99)
1877 Oil was found in the Santa
Clara area of Los Angeles County. Chevron later traced its roots to
this discovery.
(SSFC, 4/13/08, p.C5)
1879 Sep 10, Pacific Coast Oil Co.
was founded in San Francisco by Lloyd Tevis, George Loomis and Charles
Felton. It eventually became ChevronTexaco.
(SFC, 10/20/04, p.C6)
1880 Nov 8, Edwin Drake (b.1819),
the man who drilled the first productive oil well (1859), died
penniless.
(www.todayinsci.com)
1880 The Pacific Coast Oil Co.
built its 1st refinery at Alameda Port.
(SFC, 10/20/04, p.C6)
1880 Oilmen in southern California
formed a company that grew to become Unocal.
(SFC, 4/5/05, p.C1)
1882 Jan 2, Because of
anti-monopoly laws, Standard Oil was organized as a trust.
(MC, 1/2/02)
1882 The Standard Oil Trust began
and issued its first stock signed by John D. Rockefeller. The trust was
preceded by the Standard Oil Company. All pre-1920 stocks were printed
by the American Banknote Co. John D. Rockefeller by this time had
acquired 77 separate oil companies and controlled some 90 percent of
the refinery and pipeline business in the country through the Standard
Oil Trust.
(Cont, 12/97, p.58)(HNQ, 1/23/00)
1885 Sep 5, The 1st gasoline pump
was delivered to a gasoline dealer in Ft. Wayne, Ind.
(MC, 9/5/01)
1890 The Royal Dutch Petroleum Co.
was founded.
(WSJ, 11/2/04, p.A14)
1899 The Los Angeles Oil Exchange
was established to handle the securities of oil companies in southern
California.
(SSFC, 1/25/04, p.I3)
1899 In California wildcatters
discovered oil along the Kern River in Bakersfield.
(SSFC, 4/13/08, p.C1)
1900 Standard Oil Co. acquired
Pacific Oil Co.
(SFC, 10/20/04, p.C6)
1901 English millionaire William
Knox D’Arcy arranged to pay £40,000 in cash and company stock to
the Shah of Tehran, Muzaffar al-Din, for the right to drill for oil in
western Persia. The deal included a pledge, should commercial
production begin, to pay the Persian government 16% of annual profits
until 1961.
(ON, 8/08, p.1)
1902 The Pacific Coast Oil
refinery at Alameda Port, owned by Standard Oil, was replaced by the
Richmond refinery.
(SFC, 10/20/04, p.C6)
1902 The Texas Fuel Co. was
founded. It soon changed its name to the Texas Co. and eventually
became Texaco.
(SFC, 10/20/04, p.C6)
1904 Jan 19, A team of oil
drillers led by George Reynolds and funded by English millionaire
William Knox D’Arcy, struck oil at Chiah Surkh, Persia, but by March
the volume dwindled to an unprofitable trickle.
(ON, 8/08, p.2)
1904 Ida Tarbell (1857-1944),
journalist, published the 2-volume "History of the Standard Oil
Company." It revealed the illegal means used by John D. Rockefeller to
gain a monopoly and control oil prices and began as a series in
McClure's Magazine in 1902. This led to a federal investigation and the
1911 order by the Supreme Court for the breakup of Standard Oil.
(WSJ, 12/15/98, p.B1)(WSJ, 9/13/99, p.R4)(HNQ,
6/22/00)
1906-1916 In Daly City, Ca., businesses made gas out
of oil at 731 Schwerin St.
(SFC, 3/2/09, p.B1)
1907 Britain and Russia carved
Iran into spheres of influence.
(WSJ, 4/2/07, p.A6)
1907 Royal Dutch combines its oil
operations with Shell Transport & Trading Co.
(WSJ, 11/2/04, p.A14)
1908 May 26, The first major oil
strike in the Middle East took place as engineers working for British
entrepreneur William Knox D'Arcy and led by George B. Reynolds hit a
gusher more than 1,100 feet below ground in Masjid-i-Suleiman, Persia
(Iran). The Concessions Syndicate Limited, later the Anglo-Persian Oil
Co., included the Burmah Oil Company of Glasgow, Scotland, and the
Persian oil project of William Knox D'Arcy.
(WSJ, 9/13/99, p.R4)(WSJ, 4/2/07, p.A6)(AP,
5/26/08)(ON, 8/08, p.3)
1911 May 15, The Supreme Court
ordered the dissolution of Standard Oil Company, ruling it was in
violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act. The anti-trust suit led to the
dissolution of Standard Oil Co. of John D. Rockefeller. From its
remains 34 new companies were formed that included Exxon, Mobil, Amoco,
Chevron, Arco and Conoco. Rockefeller’s quarter interest in the parent
turned into a quarter interest in all the offspring.
(AP, 5/15/97)(WSJ, 5/8/98, p.W10)
1912 Standard Oil established
America’s first gas station in Cincinnati.
(F, 10/7/96, p.67)
1913 Dec 1, The first drive-in
automobile service station, built by Gulf Refining Co., opened in
Pittsburgh. [see Cincinnati in 1912]
(AP, 12/1/06)
1914 Venezuela’s 1st oil gusher
was drilled near Lake Maracibo.
(WSJ, 4/18/02, p.A9)
1914 The discovery of oil in
Venezuela prompted Royal Dutch/Shell to build an oil refinery on
Curacao.
(Econ, 6/19/04, p.72)
1923 The US established a
22-million-acre National Petroleum Reserve near Prudhoe Bay, Alaska.
(Econ, 12/11/04, p.28)(SFC, 1/22/05, p.A5)
1923 In South Dakota Gov. William
McMaster bought cut rate gas from a Chicago distributor and began
selling it at a state depot for 16 cents a gallon. Standard Oil was
charging 26.6 cents (equal to about $3.16 in 2008), which he called
“highway robbery.” Standard oil cut its price to 16.6 cents and other
states began to demand the same price. McMaster and Standard eventually
negotiated a price of 20 cents a gallon.
(WSJ, 3/31/08, p.B1)
1923 German researchers Franz
Fischer and Hans Tropsch, working at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute,
developed a process for converting coal to gas, which was then used to
make synthetic fuels.
(WSJ, 8/16/06,
p.A12)(www.encyclopedia.com/html/F/FischerT1.asp)
1926 Apr 7, In San Luis Obispo,
Ca., lightning sparked a 5-day oil fire killing 2 people. Over 6
million barrels of oil were burned. Final damages were estimated at $15
million.
(SFC, 4/7/09, p.D8)
1927 Oil was discovered near
Kirkuk, Iraq, the 1st commercial find in any Arab country.
(SSFC, 4/13/03, p.E1)
1928 Mar 27, The U.S. accepted the
new oil-land laws enacted by Mexico, ending a long-standing dispute
between Mexico and the United States.
(HN, 3/27/98)
1928 Oct 25, An American group,
led by James A. Talbot of Richfield Oil, acquired control of the
American airplane business of Anthony H.G. Fokker.
(SFC, 10/24/03, p.E10)
1930 May 8, The Richfield Oil
Company tanker Richfield wrecked on the rocks off Point Reyes, Ca.,
with a cargo or 25,000 gallons of high-test gasoline.
(SFC, 5/6/05, p.F3)
1932 Jun 6, A US Federal gas tax
was enacted.
(MC, 6/6/02)
1932 Jul 9, John Paul Getty II,
US-British oil magnate, billionaire (Getty Oil), was born.
(MC, 7/9/02)
1932 May 31, Socal, formerly
Standard Oil of California, discovered oil in Bahrain. This was the 1st
middle eastern oil discovered by an American firm.
(SFC, 10/20/04,
p.C6)(www.saudiaramcoworld.com/issue/199901/prelude.to.discovery.htm)
1932 Reza Shah revoked the
Anglo-Persian Co. oil monopoly.
(WSJ, 4/2/07, p.A6)
1933 May, Saudi Arabia gave
Standard Oil of California exclusive rights to explore for oil. Socal
formed the California Arabian Standard Oil Co. to drill for oil in
Saudi Arabia.
(www.chevron.com)(SFC, 10/20/04, p.C6)
1933 Petromex was formed during
the presidency of Abelardo L. Rodriguez.
(www.trinity.edu/jgonzal1/341f96g1.html)
1935 Jan 14, The oil pipeline from
Iraq to the Mediterranean went into use.
(MC, 1/14/02)
1936 Jan, Standard Oil of
California found some gas and oil at their 1st Saudi Arabia test well,
Damman No. 1.
(www.chevron.com)
1936 Mar 3, Standard Oil of
California struck oil at Damman No 7. Aramco made the first commercial
oil find in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. The English Arabist, H. St. John
Philby, orchestrated the Aramco concession in Saudi Arabia.
(HN, 3/15/98)(WSJ, 3/8/99, p.A16)(SFEC, 6/27/99,
p.T3)(www.chevron.com)
1936 The Texas Co. joined Standard
Oil in Saudi Arabia. The joint venture eventually became the Saudi oil
giant Aramco.
(SFC, 10/20/04, p.C6)
1937 Jan 30, Mexico's Pres. Lazaro
Cardenas created the AGPN, "Administracion General del Petroleo
Nacional." The AGPN became a public organism that would guide the
Mexican oil industry. The creation of the AGPN constituted the
transformation of Petromex into a publicly driven firm.
(www.trinity.edu/jgonzal1/341f96g1.html)
1938 Mar 18, Mexican President
Lazaro Cardenas nationalized his country's petroleum reserves and took
control of foreign-owned oil facilities.
(WSJ, 3/20/96, p.A-1)(WSJ, 6/14/96, p.A15)(AP,
3/18/08)
1938 Mar 27, The U.S. stopped
buying Mexican silver in reprisal for the Mexican seizure of American
oil companies.
(HN, 3/27/98)
1938 Nov 24, Mexico seized oil
land adjacent to Texas.
(HN, 11/24/98)
1938 Hammond Chaffetz (d.2001 at
93) won a big price-fixing case against the oil industry. 30 oil
executives were convicted along with 16 major oil companies for
violating the Sherman Antitrust Act.
(SFC, 1/18/01, p.C2)
1938 Oil was found in Kuwait.
(SSFC, 4/13/03, p.E1)
1938 Inventor Earl Silas Tupper
left the Du Pont company in 1938 to form the Tupper Plastics Company.
The material called "Poly-T" used to create Tupperware was developed
from a black, putrid, rock-hard oil refining waste product called
polyethylene slag. He refined and purified the slag into a higher
quality plastic. He then turned his attention to replacing the widely
used glass and metal food containers with his waterproof and airtight
seal introduced in 1947.
(HNQ, 2/13/99)
1938-1992 Mobil Oil operated a fueling facility at
San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf during this period. In 2008 the city
sued Exxon-Mobil to force a cleanup of the site and pay damages and
attorney fees.
(WSJ, 6/20/08, p.B3)
1940 Jul, Avila Camacho was
elected president of Mexico. He agreed to compensate the
multi-nationals for their oil losses and a new market for Mexican oil
opened, i.e. the US.
(www.mexconnect.com)
1942 Jul 22, Gasoline rationing
involving the use of coupons began along the Atlantic seaboard.
(AP, 7/22/99)
1943 Aug 1, Over 177 B-24
Liberator bombers attacked the German oil fields in Ploesti, Romania,
for a second time. Of 1,762 airmen on the mission, 532 were killed,
captured, interned or listed as missing in action. In 2007 Duane
Schultz authored “Into the Fire: Ploesti” The Most Fateful Mission of
World War II.
(HN, 8/1/98)(WSJ, 11/13/07, p.D5)
1943 Two American oil firms
decided to expand their refinery in Bahrain and hired Bechtel. Capacity
was doubled to 65,000 barrels per day.
(SSFC, 5/4/03, p.A8)
1945 Aug 15, Gasoline and fuel oil
rationing ended in the United States.
(HN, 8/15/98)
1950 South Africa set up Sasol as
a state-owned company and authorized funds for the development of a
coal-to-liquids facility called Sasolburg.
(WSJ, 8/16/06, p.A12)
1950 An industrial explosion
exacerbated oil leakage into Newtown Creek, which separates Brooklyn
from Queens. The problem was ignored until the coast Guard rediscovered
it in 1978 and determined that oil was leaking from nearby refineries
and storage facilities. In 1990 ExxonMobil signed a consent agreement
with the state of NY to clean up the creek. In 2007 oil still floated
on the water.
(Econ, 7/28/07, p.32)
1951 Mar 15, Persia nationalized
the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.
(MC, 3/15/02)
1951 Jun 24, Persian army took
over nationalized oil installations.
(MC, 6/24/02)
1951 Sep 27, Persian troops
occupied oil refinery at Abadan.
(MC, 9/27/01)
1951 There was a struggle to
nationalize Iranian oil.
(SFEC, 4/13/97, BR p.4)
1951 Saudi Arabia put the Ghawar
oil field into production. It measured 20 miles wide and 175 miles long
and was the largest oil field ever found.
(WSJ, 5/6/08, p.A15)
1952 Apr 23, Oil pipeline from
Kirkuk, Iraq, to Banias was completed.
(MC, 4/23/02)
1953 Mar, The US CIA’s Tehran
station reported that an Iranian general had approached the US embassy
for support in an army-led coup. Based on this information Allen
Dulles, director of the CIA, approved $1 million to be used to help
bring about the fall of Prime Minister Mossadegh. Pres. Eisenhower gave
the CIA the ok to overthrow the elected government of PM Mohammad
Mossadegh. Mossadegh had nationalized the Anglo-Iranian Oil Co. after
Britain refused to compromise and split profits 50-50. In 2003 Stephen
Kinzer authored "All the Shah's Men: An American Coup and the Roots of
the Middle East Terror."
(SFEC, 4/16/00, p.A18)(SSFC, 8/24/03, p.M6)
1953 Jul 14, The freighter Jacob
Luckenbach from SF rammed the Matson freighter Hawaiian Pilot near
Point Montara, 17 miles from the Golden Gate. The Luckenbach sank while
the Hawaiian Pilot limped to SF. Oil leaked from the Luckenbach later
killed numerous birds. In 2002 a $3.5 million plan for cleanup was
begun. A $19 million cleanup ended in Sep.
(Ind, 3/31/01, 5A)(SFC, 2/5/02, p.A15)(SFC, 5/8/02,
p.A22)(SFC, 10/1/02, p.A13)
1953 Aug 19, Gen'l. Zahedi ousted
PM Mossadegh and became the Premier of Iran in a bloody coup that left
300 dead. Britain and the US CIA under Allen Dulles planned a secret
mission to overthrow the government. PM Mossadeq had sought to
nationalize the Anglo-Persian Oil Co. The US government made a formal
apology for the coup in 2000. A 1954 CIA description of the coup was
made public in 2000. In 1979 Kermit Roosevelt (d.2000) published
“Countercoup: The Struggle for the Control of Iran,” an account of his
role in the coup.
(SFC, 11/20/53, p.A1)(SFC, 11/15/99, p.E6)(SFC,
5/29/97, p.A4)(WSJ, 3/20/00, p.A1)(SFEC, 4/16/00, p.A18)(SFEC, 6/11/00,
p.D6)(WSJ, 4/2/07, p.A6)
1953 Italy founded ENIPower, a
state attempt to challenge the oil majors.
(Econ, 8/21/04, p.53)
1956 Mar 8, On the 2nd day of a
3-day regional conference of the Southern District Division of
Production, American Petroleum Institute, in San Antonio, Texas, M.
King Hubbert, a Shell geologist, predicted that US oil production for
the 48 states would peak (i.e., reach a maximum annual extraction rate)
in 1965 if the nation ultimately produced 150 billion barrels, and in
1969 if the nation ultimately produced 200 billion barrels. 1970 turned
out to be the peak year, both for the 48 states and for the 50 states
including Alaska.
(SSFC, 3/21/04, p.J3)(WSJ, 6/28/05, p.D8)
1956 In Nigeria Shell became the
first company to strike oil at Oloibiri (later Bayelsa state).
(AP, 6/1/06)
1957 Hondo Oil Co., led by Robert
O. Anderson (1917-2007), discovered the quarter-billion-barrel
Empire-Abo oilfield in southeast New Mexico.
(WSJ, 12/8/07, p.A7)
1959 China discovered huge oil
reserves in the northern basin of the Songhua and Liao Rivers. This
ended dependence on Soviet supplies. The area was named Daqing (Great
Happiness).
(WSJ, 3/1/00, p.A8)(Econ, 5/1/04, p.41)
1960 Sep 14, Iraq, Iran, Kuwait,
Saudi Arabia and Venezuela formed OPEC. Fuad Rouhani (1907-2004) of
Iran served as its 1st secretary-general. In 1964 he was succeeded by
Abdul Rahman Bazzaz of Iraq.
(HN, 9/14/98)(WSJ, 7/28/03, p.A8)
1960 New discoveries of oil peaked.
(WSJ, 6/28/05, p.D8)
1962 Abu Dhabi began exporting the
oil it just discovered off its shores.
(AP, 11/3/04)
1962 A gas fire in Algeria called
“The Devil’s Cigarette Lighter” had burned for 6 months until it was
put out by Texas firefighter Red Adair (1915-2004).
(Econ, 8/14/04, p.78)
1964-1992 Texaco dumped some 18 billion gallons of
toxic waste into open pits, estuaries and rivers and allegedly polluted
some 2.5 million acres of pristine rain forest. Texaco merged with
Chevron in 2001 and a suit over the toxic waste went to trial in
Ecuador in 2003.
(SFC, 5/1/03, A8)(SFC, 10/21/03, p.A3)
1965 Nov 9, A major power failure
hit the East Coast of the US. New York City experienced a major
blackout just after 5:30 PM. In the great Northeast blackout several US
states and parts of Canada were hit by a series of power failures
lasting up to 13 1/2 hours. Nine Northeastern states and parts of
Canada went dark in the worst power failure in history, when a switch
at a station near Niagara Falls failed.
(HFA, '96,p.42)(SFE,10/1/95, Z1, p.10)(AP,
11/9/97)(HN, 11/9/98)
1966 During a fishing retreat
Robert O. Anderson, head of Atlantic Refining Co., sealed a merger deal
with the head of Richfield Oil Corp., creating the Atlantic-Richfield
Co. (ARCO).
(WSJ, 12/8/07, p.A7)
1966 Oil discovered in Dubai (UAR)
provided cash for modernization projects such as the world’s largest
man-made harbor at Jebel Ali.
(Econ, 5/29/04, p.61)
1967 Dec 26, Atlantic Richfield
oil workers struck oil on Alaska’s North Slope at Prudhoe Bay.
(AH, 10/04, p.42)
1968 Mar 13, Atlantic Richfield
Company (ARCO) and Humble Oil and Refining Company (now Exxon Company,
U.S.A.) announced the discovery of oil on Alaska’s North Slope (Prudhoe
Bay). The oil companies soon began efforts to construct a pipeline, but
work was suspended due to environmental concerns.
(AH, 2/05,
p.14)(www.alyeska-pipe.com/Pipelinefacts/Chronology.html)
1968 Oct 9, The new military
government of Peru seized the country's oil fields.
(AP, 10/9/08)
1969 Jul 24, Petroleos del Peru
(PETROPERU S.A.) was created (law No.17753) as a state-owned entity.
(http://tinyurl.com/554vke)
1969 Nov 5, Bolivia nationalized
its energy sector a 2nd time. Marcelo Quiroga Santa Cruz, the Minister
of Mines and Petroleum, nationalized the assets and concessions of the
Gulf Oil Company, under the administration of General Alfredo Ovando
Candia (1969-1970).
(http://countrystudies.us/bolivia/60.htm)(http://tinyurl.com/blqnw7)
1969 George B. Kaiser took over
Kaiser-Francis Oil Co., a small family oil firm founded in the 1940s by
his uncle and parents, Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany, who had
settled in Oklahoma. Operations at the time were limited to Kansas. By
2004 the firm had over $600 million in revenues from oil and gas
production.
(WSJ, 7/23/04, p.A1)
1969 Atlantic Richfield Co.
(ARCO), led by Robert O. Anderson, merged with Sinclair Oil.
(WSJ, 12/8/07, p.A7)
1969 John Latsis (1910-2003),
Greek shipping magnate, established Petrola, the 1st export-oriented
oil refinery in Greece.
{Greece, Oil}
(SFC, 4/18/03, p.A24)
1970 Wang Jinxi (47), icon of
Chinese communism, died. Known as the “iron man,” he helped turn Daqing
into China’s biggest oil production center.
(Econ, 1/10/04, p.60)
1971 Jan 18, Two Standard Oil
tankers collided in the fog a quarter mile west of the Golden Gate
Bridge. The Arizona Standard ripped into the Oregon Standard and caused
the spill of some 1.9 million gallons of heavy bunker oil.
(SFEC, 2/23/96, Z1 p.5)
1971 Feb 3, OPEC decided to set
oil prices without consulting buyers.
(HN, 2/3/99)
1971 Feb 24, Algeria nationalized
French oil companies.
(www.nationsencyclopedia.com/Africa/Algeria-ENERGY-AND-POWER.html)
1971 Mar, Mexican fisherman
Rudesindo Cantarell took geologists of Petroleos Mexicanos to an site
where oil impacted his nets. The Cantarell field turned out to be one
of the largest offshore oil fields ever found. In 2006-2006 production
fell 20% as the reserve declined.
(WSJ, 4/5/07, p.A1)
1971 Tesoro Corp. was listed on
the NYSE. Robert V. West Jr. (1921-2006), founder of the oil company
(1964), retired in San Antonio, Tx., in 1992.
(WSJ, 11/25/06, p.A6)
1971-1983 Stagflation, a period of rising inflation,
high oil prices and weak labor markets, marked the global economy.
(Econ, 5/7/05,
p.13)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stagflation)
1972 Jun 1, Iraq nationalized the
Iraq Petroleum Company controlled by British, American, Dutch and
French oil companies.
(SFC, 9/24/02,
p.A10)(www.globalpolicy.org/security/oil/5873nation.htm)
1973 Mar 6, President Richard
Nixon imposed price controls on oil and gas.
(WSJ, 11/4/96, p.C1)(HN, 3/6/98)
1973 Oct 16, OPEC, the Arab
oil-producing nations, announced they would begin cutting back on oil
exports to Western nations and Japan. The next day, the five Arab
members of the OPEC committee were joined in Kuwait by the oil
ministers of Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Libya, and Syria. The result was
a total embargo that lasted until March 1974 and caused oil prices to
quadruple. During the OPEC oil embargo oil prices were increased
fourfold. Japan experienced its first oil crises with the Middle East
war. The US experienced a gasoline shortage.
(WSJ, 4/24/95, p.R-5) (WSJ, 6/19/96, Adv.
Supl)(www.harvardir.org/articles/1659/)(AP, 10/17/97)(WSJ, 7/28/03,
p.A8)(Jap. Enc., BLDM, p. 216)(WSJ, 1/11/99, p.R49)
1973 Oct 20, Arab oil-producing
nations banned oil exports to the United States, following the outbreak
of Arab-Israeli war.
(HN, 10/20/98)
1973 Nov 16, President Nixon
signed the Trans Alaska Pipeline Authorization Act into law. Oil
companies formed a consortium that gave British Petroleum 50.1% control
of the pipeline.
(www.alyeska-pipe.com/Pipelinefacts/Chronology.html)(AH, 10/04, p.43)
1973 Nov 19, Saudi Arabia, Libya
and other Arab states proclaimed a total ban on oil exports to the
United States. Gasoline prices quadrupled from twenty-five cents per
gallon to over one dollar. The New York stock market took its sharpest
drop in 19 years.
(HN,
11/19/98)(www.bullnotbull.com/archive/market-01222006.html)
1973 Oil was discovered off the
coast of Louisiana at the underwater site called Eugene Island 330. By
1989 production slowed to 4,000 barrels from a peak of 15,000 and then
suddenly increased and in 1999 produced 13,000 barrels a day.
Geologists were unable to account for the source of the oil.
(WSJ, 4/16/99, p.A1)
1974 Jan 2, President Nixon signed
legislation requiring states to limit highway speeds to 55 mph. Federal
speed limits were abolished in 1995. The legislation was conceived by
Claude Brinegar (1926-2009), Nixon’s secretary of transportation.
(AP, 1/2/98)(http://tinyurl.com/45ywak)(SFC,
3/18/09, p.B6)
1974 Feb 15, US gasoline stations
threatened to close because of federal fuel policies.
(HN, 2/15/98)
1974 Mar 17 Arab oil ministers,
with the exception of Libya, announced the end the oil embargo on the
US.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1973_oil_crisis)
1974 Nov 29, Haroldson L. Hunt
(b.1889), Texas oil man and multi-millionaire, died.
(www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKhuntHL.htm)
1974 Dec 24, An oil spill polluted
1,600 square miles of scenic Inland Sea in Japan.
(HN, 12/24/98)
1974 Mobil Oil gained control of
Montgomery Ward.
(SFC, 12/29/00, p.A12)
1974 The US economy cooled, prices
climbed with much wealth transferred to the Arabs for oil.
(TMC, 1994, p.1974)
1974 Oil was discovered in Chad.
(WSJ, 6/24/03, p.A9)
1974 In France the economy slowed
following the Arab oil embargo and the policy of recruiting foreign
labor ended.
(NG, 5/93, p.110)
1974 In France the Int'l. Energy
Agency was formed in Paris to coordinate oil sharing. The US led the
formation of the IEA in order to stockpile oil and help offset supply
shortages.
(WSJ, 9/13/99, p.R4)(WSJ, 7/28/03, p.A8)
1975 Mar 6, OPEC held a meeting in
Algiers attended for the first time by its members’ top leaders. Here
the Algiers Accord between Baghdad and Teheran put an end to their
border dispute and brought all Iranian help to the Kurdish rebellion to
a halt. The United States abruptly withdrew its support for the Kurds
and the rebellion collapsed. Many thousands of Kurdish fighters and
their families were forced to flee to Iran to escape the pursuing Iraqi
army.
(http://mondediplo.com/2002/10/06timeline)(SFC,
11/19/07, p.A11)
1975 Mar 27, The 1st pipe of the
Alaska oil pipeline was laid at Tonsina River.
(www.alyeska-pipe.com/Pipelinefacts/Chronology.html)
1975 Nov 3, Queen Elizabeth
formally began the operation of the UK's first North Sea oil pipeline
at a ceremony in Scotland.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/november/3/newsid_2538000/2538155.stm)
1975 Nov 5, The scrapped passenger
ship Queen Elizabeth rolled over and disgorged several tons of oil in
Hong Kong.
(www.cunard.co.uk)
1975 Dec 22, The Energy Policy and
Conservation Act (EPCA) made it policy for the US to establish a
reserve up to one billion barrels (159 million m³) of petroleum.
The Strategic Petroleum Reserve was created to provide a guaranteed
domestic supply. The oil was put into salt domes on the Gulf Coast near
the Texas-Louisiana border. The storage capacity was 700 million
barrels.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Petroleum_Reserve)(SFC,
11/14/01, p.A15)
1975 Anthony Sampson authored "The
Seven Sisters: The Great Oil Companies and the World They Made."
(SSFC, 2/8/04, p.A31)
1975 In Brazil the military
government launched a "pro-alcohol" program as a source of fuel in
response to the first oil crisis which hit in 1973. The country at the
time was importing 80% of its fuel and suffered in its balance of
payments.
{Brazil, oil}
(WSJ, 6/27/97, p.A9A)
1976 Jun 6, Jean Paul Getty
(b.1892), US oil magnate, billionaire, died. He left $1.2 billion as an
endowment for a museum and art activities around the world.
(SFC, 7/15/96,
p.D2)(http://wapedia.mobi/en/J._Paul_Getty)
1976 Dec 21, The
Liberian-registered tanker Argo Merchant ran aground near Nantucket
Island, spilling millions of gallons of oil into the North Atlantic.
(AP, 12/21/97)
1976 The Alaska Permanent Fund was
created after oil was discovered on the North Slope. Residents of over
a year received an annual dividend from the fund.
(SFC, 9/27/02, p.A7)
1976 The world’s last major oil
field, yielding over a million barrels a day, was found in Mexico.
(WSJ, 6/28/05, p.D8)
1977 May 31, The trans-Alaska oil
pipeline was completed after three years of work.
(AP, 5/31/97)
1977 Jul 13, A 25-hour power
blackout hit the New York City area and looters rampaged in the city
after lightning struck upstate power lines. Some 9 million people were
affected.
(TMC, 1994, p.1977)(AP, 7/13/97)(SFC, 8/15/03, p.A7)
1977 Jun 20, The 1st oil of the
Alaska pipeline began to flow south 799 miles from Prudhoe Bay to the
port of Valdez. [see Jul 28]
(www.alyeska-pipe.com/pipelinefacts.html)
1977 Jun 28, The 1st Prudhoe Bay
oil of the Alaska pipeline reached the port of Valdez as construction
of the Trans-Alaskan pipeline was completed.
(www.alyeska-pipe.com/pipelinefacts.html)
1978 Mar 16, The Amoco-Cadiz oil
tanker spilled a record 1.6 million barrels of crude oil off the coast
of France.
(WSJ, 9/13/99,
p.R4)(www.cedre.fr/uk/spill/amoco/amoco.htm)
1978 Chevron discovered oil in
Sudan and sank wells north of Bentiu.
(SFC, 6/13/01, p.D3)(WSJ, 10/22/03,
p.A4)(www.hrw.org/reports/2003/sudan1103/10.htm)
1978-1979 The Iranian revolution took place and oil
prices doubled.
(WSJ, 7/28/03, p.A8)
1979 May 11, SF passed an odd-even
gas sales plan in response to the gasoline crises.
(SFC, 5/7/04, p.F2)
1979 Jun 26-1979 Jun 28, OPEC
raised oil prices an average of 15%, effective July 1.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1970-1979_world_oil_market_chronology)
1979 Jul 19, Two supertankers
collided off Tobago and spilled 260,000 tons of oil. It was the worst
oil spill to date with 88 million gallons spewed.
(WSJ, 1/11/99,
p.R49)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_oil_spills)
1979 Nov 1, The tanker Burmah
Agate, spilled 10.7 million gallons of oil off Galveston Bay, Texas, in
US's worst oil spill disaster.
(http://tinyurl.com/2jwxd3)
1979 Nov 12, President Carter
announced an immediate halt to all imports of Iranian oil and freezes
Iranian assets in US. Executive Order 12170 halted oil imports from
Iran.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_hostage_crisis)
1979 Nigeria outlawed gas flaring,
to be phased out over 5 years. The law was not enforced and in 2008
some 20 billion cubic meters of year were flared, out of a global total
of 150 billion.
(Econ, 4/5/08, p.50)
1979 South Africa privatized
Sasol, a coal-to-liquids facility, and listed it on the Johannesburg
Stock Exchange.
(WSJ, 8/16/06, p.A12)
1980 Jan 7, Some 60,000 US oil
refinery workers went on nationwide strike for the 1st time in 11
years. No major disruptions were reported in the walkout.
(SFC, 1/7/05, p.F6)
1980 Sep 22, Iraq invaded Iran
following border skirmishes and a dispute over the Shatt al-Arab
waterway. This marked the beginning of a war that would last eight
years. Iraq invaded Iran striking refineries and an oil-loading
terminal on Kharg Island. The Iraqis used the political instability in
Iran to try to capture long-disputed territory. They attacked across
the Shatt al Arab River, a trunk of the great Tigris-Euphrates river
system.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/middle_east/newsid_806000/806268.stm
(AP, 9/22/97)(NG, 5/88, p.653,663)
1980 Dec, In Baiji, Iraq, Sadam
Hussein began construction of an oil refinery under the Jabal Makhul
mountains.
(SFC, 5/5/03, p.A12)
1980 French oil giant Total SA
leased an oil patch in southern Sudan the size of Pennsylvania. In 2005
the lease came under dispute as southern Sudan gained limited autonomy
and signed an oil deal with London-based White Nile Ltd.
(WSJ, 6/19/06,
p.A1)(www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article20234)
1981 Mexican crude oil peaked at
$38.50 a barrel.
(Econ, 3/6/04, p.77)
1982 May 2, A project to produce
oil from shale rock in Colorado's Roan Plateau collapsed due to
technical hurdles and falling oil prices.
(USAT, 3/5/04, p.6A)
1982 Mexico’s oil market collapsed.
(WSJ, 8/22/97, p.A10)
1983 Fred J. Cook (1911-2003)
authored "The Great Energy Scam," an examination of the oil companies.
(SFC, 5/5/03, p.B4)
1983 Trading began in NYC on
future delivery of light crude oil.
(SFC, 8/10/04, p.A1)
1984 Mar 19, The SS Mobil Oil
spilled 200,000 gallons of oil into the Columbia River near Longview.
(http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/96596_timeline21.shtml)
1984 Jul 30, The tanker Alvenus at
Cameron, La., spilled 2.8 million gallons of oil.
(MC, 7/30/02)
1984 Aug 18, Triangle Oil Corp,
above-ground storage tank at Jacksonville Fla, spilled 2.5 m gallons of
oil and burned after lightning sparked a fire.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1984 Jan 6, Texaco offered $125
per share for Getty oil stock superceding the Pennzoil offer of $112.50
per share. It became the biggest merger on record.
(SFC, 1/8/95, p.7)
1984 Mar 19, Mobil oil tanker
spilled 200,000 gallons into the Columbia River.
(MC, 3/19/02)
1984 Jul 30, The tanker Alvenus at
Cameron, La., spilled 2.8 million gallons of oil.
(MC, 7/30/02)
1984 Aug 18, Triangle Oil Corp,
above-ground storage tank at Jacksonville Fla, spilled 2.5 m gallons of
oil and burned after lightning sparked a fire.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1984 Sep 17, Oil heir Gordon P.
Getty, with a fortune of $4.1 billion dollars, was named the richest
person in the US. There were a dozen billionaires in the US at the time.
(MC, 9/17/01)
1984 Oct 31, The Puerto Rican
tanker San Francisco exploded spilling 2 million gallons of oil as the
ship caught fire.
(MC, 10/31/01)
1984 Standard Oil of California
(Socal), under George M. Keller (1923-2008), purchased Gulf Oil and its
extensive operations in Nigeria and changed its name to Chevron.
(SFC, 11/19/98, p.A8)(SFC, 10/20/04, p.C6)(SFC,
10/18/08, p.B1)
1984 William Flanagan, head of
Arriba Ltd., signed a deal with Mexico’s Petroleum Worker’s Union for
at least 6 million barrels of slop oil. The union failed to deliver and
Flanagan won a suit in 1986. The judgement ballooned to nearly $250
million in 2002 with still no settlement.
(WSJ, 2/20/02, p.A1)
1985 Aug 15, Iraqis staged an air
raid on Iran’s Kharg oil-island.
(MC, 8/15/02)
1985 California’s oil production
peaked at 423.9 million barrels.
(SSFC, 4/13/08, p.C5)
1986 Jun, In Mexico Gustavo
Petricioli Iturbe was named treasury secretary by Pres. Miguel de la
Madrid. The foreign debt was near $100 billion due to the collapse of
oil prices earlier in the decade.
(SFEC, 10/11/98, p.D10)
1986 Dr. Len Srnka patented an
electromagnetic method for locating oil deposits on behalf of Exxon Oil
Corp.
(WSJ, 8/17/04, p.A6)
1987 Mar 13, The president of
Ecuador announced his country had suspended payments on its foreign
debt after earthquakes killed hundreds of people and ruptured the
country's main oil pipeline. The quake destroyed nearly 25 miles of oil
pipeline.
(AP, 3/13/97)(SFC, 5/1/03, A8)
1987 Oct 19, U.S. Navy warships
disabled the 1st of 3 Iranian oil platforms in the Persian Gulf in
retaliation for an Iranian missile attack on a U.S.-flagged tanker off
Kuwait. [see Apr 18, 1988]
(AP, 10/19/97)(HN, 10/19/02)
1987 Oct 19, Black Monday, the
stock market crashed as the Dow Jones Industrial Average, amid frenzied
selling, plunged 508 points, 22.6%,-- its biggest-ever one-day decline.
The crash was preceded by legislation to block tax deductions for debt
incurred in corporate takeovers which were fueling the market. It was
also preceded by plunges in other international markets. Hong Kong
suffered a 46% decline in October.
(V.D.-H.K.p.253)(TMC, 1994, p.1987)(AP,
10/19/97)(SFC,10/27/97, p.B2)
1987 T. Boone Pickens, head of
Mesa Petroleum, published his autobiography “Boone.” In 2000 it was
updated under the title “The Luckiest Guy in the World.”
(WSJ, 9/10/08, p.A13)
1987 In Ecuador members of the
Tagaeri tribe killed Spanish Bishop Alejandro Lavaca and Colombian nun
Ines Arango with poison-tipped spears. The 2 had been dropped in by an
oil company helicopter to bring the word of god and discuss the arrival
of oil workers.
(SFC, 9/3/04, p.W2)
1987 Kuwait’s sovereign wealth
fund bought over 20% of British Petroleum, but the deal was
opposed by PM Margaret Thatcher. This forced the Kuwaitis so sell over
half their stake.
(Econ, 1/19/08, p.80)
1988 Jan 2, An Ashland Oil Company
tank collapsed at Floreffe near Elizabeth, Penn., sending more than
700,000 gallons of diesel oil into the Monongahela River.
(AP, 1/2/98)
1988 Jan 4, Drinking water began
to dry up in Pittsburgh suburbs because of a massive diesel oil spill
two days earlier that fouled the Monongahela and Ohio rivers.
(AP, 1/4/98)
1988 Apr 18, The United States
destroyed two more Iraqi oil platforms, after a mine in the Persian
Gulf injured 10 crewmen aboard a U.S. frigate. In 2003 a World Court in
a 14-2 decision ruled the US was wrong but doesn't need to pay damages.
(AP, 11/7/03)
1988 Apr 23, A drain valve was
left open at the Shell Marsh in Martinez, Ca., and 10,000 barrels of
oil (432,000 gallons) poured in the marsh adjoining Peyton Slough.
Shell cleaned the mess and paid $20 million in penalties. The marsh was
purchased with part of the funds and turned into a regional park.
(SFC, 4/21/98, p.A19-20)(SFC, 4/30/04, p.A17)
1988 May 4, A spectacular
explosion occurred at the Shell oil refinery in Norco, La., on the
Mississippi river just north of New Orleans. 8 people were killed and
over 40 injured.
(http://www.shellfacts.com/Chatterjee_review.html)
1988 Jul 6, A series of explosions
and fires destroyed the Piper Alpha North Sea oil drilling platform.
167 North Sea oil workers were killed.
(AP, 7/6/98)(SFC, 8/9/04, p.B6)
1988 Basin Electric Power
Cooperative of Bismarck paid the US government $85 million for the
Dakota Gasification Co. of Beulah, which had begun as a $1.5 billion
public-private venture under the Carter administration to turn reduce
US dependence on Middle East oil.
(SFC, 10/15/03, p.A4)
1989 A tanker ran aground near
Claymont, Del., spilling 300,000 gallons of heating oil into the
Delaware River.
(AP, 11/28/04)
1990 Jul 24, Iraq, accusing Kuwait
of conspiring to harm its economy through oil overproduction, massed
tens of thousands of troops and hundreds of tanks along the
Iraqi-Kuwaiti border. US warships in Persian Gulf were placed on alert.
(AP, 7/24/00)(MC, 7/24/02)
1990 Aug 2, Iraq invaded Kuwait,
seizing control of the oil-rich emirate. The day came to be known in
Kuwait as “Black Thursday.” 330 Kuwaitis died during the occupation and
war. Sadam Hussein, leader of Iraq, took over Kuwait. G. Bush led an
inter-national coalition for sanctions and a demand for withdrawal. The
Iraqis were later driven out in Operation Desert Storm.
(SFC, 9/4/96, p.A8)(TMC, 1994, p.1990)(AP,
8/2/97)(SFEC, 7/30/00, p.C18)
1990 Aug 7, President Bush ordered
U.S. troops and warplanes to Saudi Arabia to guard the oil-rich desert
kingdom against a possible invasion by Iraq. The US Persian Gulf War
began. Operation Desert Shield ended Feb 28, 1991. It cost $8.1 billion
and left 383 US casualties with 458 wounded.
(AP, 8/7/99)(WSJ, 9/22/99, p.A8)(MC, 8/7/02)
1990 Aug 18, A US frigate fired
warning shots across the bow of an Iraqi oil tanker in the Gulf of
Oman—apparently the first shots fired by the United States in the
Persian Gulf crisis.
(AP, 8/18/00)
1990 Sep 23, Iraq threatened to
destroy Middle East oil fields and attack Israel if other nations tried
to force it from Kuwait.
(AP, 9/23/00)
1990 Oct 3, Iraqi President Saddam
Hussein made his first known visit to Kuwait since his country seized
control of the oil-rich emirate.
(AP, 10/3/00)
1990 Oct 18, Iraq offered to sell
its oil to anyone—including the United States—for $21 a barrel, the
same price level that preceded the invasion of Kuwait.
(AP, 10/18/00)
1990 Dec 19, Iraq urged its people
to stockpile oil to avoid shortages should war break out, and Saddam
Hussein declared he was “ready to crush any attack.”
(AP, 12/19/00)
1990 Before the invasion of
Kuwait, Iraq was producing about 3.5 million barrels of oil per day.
(WSJ, 5/21/96, p.A-12)
1991 Jan 17, Crude oil futures
fell $10.56 following the release of strategic US crude oil stockpiles
coinciding with the start of the Persian Gulf War.
(WSJ, 8/23/08, p.B6)
1991 Jan 23, Iraqi forces in
Kuwait deliberately created a huge oil spill in the Persian Gulf.
(SFC, 2/24/98, p.A9)
1991 Jan 25, During the Gulf War
Iraq sabotaged Kuwait’s main supertanker loading pier, dumping an
estimated 460 million gallons of crude oil into the Persian Gulf.
Missiles fired from western Iraq struck in the Tel Aviv and Haifa
areas, killing one Israeli and injuring more than 40 others.
(AP, 1/25/01)(SFC, 11/20/02, p.A14)
1991 Mar 7, Iraq continued to
explode oil fields in Kuwait.
(www.parstimes.com/spaceimages/fires-kuwait-2.jpg)
1991 Aug 7, The five permanent
members of the UN Security Council agreed to authorize Iraq to sell as
much as $1.6 billion in oil over six months to pay for food,
humanitarian supplies and war reparations; however, Baghdad rejected
the resolution.
(AP, 8/7/01)
1991 Aug 15, The UN Security
Council, by a vote of 13-to-one, authorized Iraq to export
one-point-six billion dollars’ worth of oil in a tightly controlled
sale to pay for desperately needed food and medicine.
(AP, 8/15/01)
1992 Daniel Yergin authored “The
Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money and Power.”
(SSFC, 4/13/03, p.E6)
1992 Texaco quit drilling in
Ecuador after nearly 30 years. It left behind a toxic dump of some 1.8
million gallons of spilled crude oil.
(SFC, 5/1/03, A8)
1993 Jun 16, The UN authorized an
arms and oil embargo against Haiti.
(www.un.org/News/ossg/haiti.htm)
1994 Aug 11, A US federal jury
awarded $286.8 million to some 10,000 commercial fishermen for losses
as a result of the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska.
(AP, 8/11/99)
1995 Mar 1, The Bosnian Serb
government received a $60 million mortgage for the oil refinery in
Srpski Brod from a Liberian-owned company, Orbal Marketing Service Ltd.
[see Jan 1995] Delivery was made to the Bosnian Serbs in late March of
a supposed nuclear device of red mercury at the Gradiska border. It was
discovered to be a swindle.
(SFEC,12/14/97, p.A25)
1995 Mar 15, President Clinton
issued an executive order formally blocking a $1 billion contract
between Conoco and Iran to develop a huge offshore oil tract in the
Persian Gulf.
(AP, 3/15/00)
1995 Apr 14, The UN Security
Council (Resolution 986) gave permission to Iraq, still under sanctions
for its invasion of Kuwait, to sell $2 billion dollars' worth of oil to
buy food, medicine and other supplies. Iraq later rejected the offer.
(AP, 4/14/00)(SFC, 9/24/02, p.A12)
1995 Oct 20, Tiger guerrillas blew
up two oil depots in Colombo, Sri Lanka.
(SFC, 7/24/96, p.A9)
1995 US lawmakers passed a royalty
relief bill to spur production in the Gulf of Mexico as oil costs
averaged $18.43 per barrel.
(SFC, 2/15/06, p.C3)
1995 Iran awarded a $1 billion
contract to the American oil firm Conoco, but US Pres. Clinton scuttled
the deal and subsequently banned US companies from most forms of
trading with Iran. He accused Tehran of continued support for
international terrorism. Iran then awarded the oil contract to the
French firm Total.
(SFC, 4/14/96, p.A14)
1995 Activists forced a reversal
of Royal Dutch Shell plans to sink the Brent Spar oil platform.
(WSJ, 11/2/04, p.A14)
1995 A strong wind pushed a tanker
away from a refinery dock in West Deptford, N.J., snapping a fuel line
that spilled 40,000 gallons into the Delaware River.
(AP, 11/28/04)
1995 Equatorial Guinea's Zafiro
field, located northwest of Bioko Island, was discovered by ExxonMobil
and Ocean Energy (bought by Devon Energy in 2003). It contains the
majority of the country's oil reserves.
(www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/eqguinea.html)
1995-1998 The Yadana pipeline and offshore natural
gas production facilities were built by a consortium of Total, Unocal
and Myanmar Oil and Gas Enterprise.
(SFC, 4/29/08, p.D1)
1996 Feb 15, The Sea Empress
grounded off of Wales and spilled 18 million gallons (72,000 tons) of
oil.
(SFC, 11/20/02,
p.A14)(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/low/uk_news/55393.stm)
1996 May 16, UN and Iraqi
officials reached a tentative agreement to resume oil sales of $4
billion a year to buy food and medicine. The oil for food program
mandated that 13% of the UN resources go to northern Kurdish areas. In
2004 it was reported that illicit trade agreements with neighbors
netted Iraq nearly $11 billion between 1990 and 2003. In 2004 the
estimate for illicit trade was raised to $21.3 billion. In 2008 Michael
Soussan authored “Backstabbing for Beginners: My Crash Course in
International Diplomacy,” in which he tells of his 3-year close-up
experience in the UN’s Oil for Food program beginning in 1997.
(SFC, 5/16/96, p.A-9)(SFC, 9/3/01, p.A9)(SFC,
10/9/04, p.A15)(SFC, 11/16/04, p.A9)(WSJ, 11/14/08, p.A15)
1996 May 18, A 40 year agreement
was signed between Royal Dutch/Shell and Perupetro, Peru’s state oil
company. Royal Dutch will spend $2.7 bil to develop a natural gas field.
(SFC, 5/18/96, p.D-6)
1996 Aug 23, It was reported that
British Petroleum signed a 3-year agreement with the defense ministry
of Columbia for $60 mil. for a battalion of soldiers to protect
expansion and construction of new drilling sites.
(SFC, 8/23/96, p.A20)
1996 Nov, The Canadian firm
Hurricane Hydrocarbons Ltd. (later known as PetroKazakhstan Inc. of
Calgary) won the bidding in the country’s first oilfield privatization.
For $120 million it acquired a field producing 50,000 barrels a day
with reserves of 340 million barrels. The deal was accompanied by an
array of social obligations. It later faced problems with the Kazakh
government over fuel pricing and environmental rules.
(WSJ, 11/18/97, p.A1)(WSJ, 6/1/05, p.A11)
1996 A West Coast power blackout
affected 4 million people.
(SFC, 8/15/03, p.A7)
1996 Bolivia passed a hydrocarbons
law that paved the way for privatizations.
(Econ, 9/13/03, p.34)
1996 The Argentine oil firm
Compania General de Combustibles (CGC) received a contract to drill for
oil Sarayaca, Ecuador, home to some 2,000 Quichua Indians. Natives
fended off oil drilling well into 2004.
(SFC, 8/13/04, p.W1)
1997 A US federal judge allowed a
lawsuit to proceed against Unocal, accusing the oil company of
complicity in human rights abuses on the Yadana project in Myanmar. The
decision opened the door to suing US corporations on their behaviour
pverseas.
(SFC, 4/29/08, p.D1)
1998 Mar, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela
and Mexico began talking to reduce oil output. They pledged to take
2-3% of the world’s oil production off the market in what came to be
called the Riyadh Pact.
(WSJ, 6/23/98, p.A1)
1998 Aug 14, In China flooding in
Daqing broke a levee protecting the nation’s largest oil field. 155 0f
20,000 wells were closed as 200,000 people fought the flood.
(SFC, 8/15/98, p.A10)
1998 May 29, Two activists were
killed by the Nigerian Mobile Police on Chevron’s Parabe oil production
platform. The police were flown in on Chevron helicopters following 4
days of protests. In 2009 a federal judge upheld a San Francisco jury’s
verdict that cleared Chevron of wrongdoing in the shootings.
(SFC, 11/19/98, p.A8,9)(SFC, 3/5/09, p.C1)
1998 Texaco completed a $40
million oil cleanup in Ecuador. The Ecuadoran government, PetroEcuador
and 5 municipalities released the company from all liabilities and
obligations related to its oil operations. A class-action suit against
ChevronTexaco opened in 2003.
(SFC, 10/21/03, p.A3)(Econ, 5/16/09, p.42)
1999 Dec 12, The Erika, a Maltese
registered oil tanker, broke in two during a storm off the coast of
Brest, France, with 8 million gallons of diesel oil. Half the ship was
towed to deeper waters and 3 million gallons were spilled. In 2008 a
French court found Total SA guilty of maritime pollution and fined it
the maximum penalty of $560,000. It also ordered Total and three other
defendants to pay total damages of $285 million.
(SFC, 12/13/99, p.A13)(WSJ, 12/13/99, p.A1)(SFC,
11/20/02, p.A14)(AP, 1/16/08)
1999 British North Sea oil
production peaked at 4.5 million barrels per day with Britain as the
world’s 6th biggest producer of oil and gas. By 2007 Britain dropped to
12th biggest.
(Econ, 7/14/07, p.59)(Econ, 3/8/08, p.65)
2000 Feb 5, An oil pipeline began
leaking and released some 25,000 gallons below the surface of a frozen
pond in the John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge in southwest
Philadelphia.
(SFC, 2/7/00, p.A10)
2000 Mar 28, Nine of 11 OPEC
nations voted to raise oil production by a total of 1.45 million
barrels a day.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A1)
2000 May 15, A consortium of
Western oil companies found a large oil reserve in the northern Caspian
Sea off the coast of Kazakhstan. The 480-sq. mile Kashagan field was
estimated at 8 to 50 billion barrels of oil. In 2007 it was reported
that the Kashagan field contained some 12-billion barrels of oil.
(SFC, 5/16/00, p.A14)(Econ, 11/17/07, p.43)
2000 Sep 27, OPEC’s top leaders
gathered in Caracas for a 2-day meeting. OPEC speakers called on
Western countries to reduce taxes levied on oil to ease prices.
(SFC, 9/27/00, p.A1)(SFC, 9/28/00, p.A1)
2000 Oct 13, Chevron announced
plans to acquire Texaco in a deal valued at $37 billion. Chevron and
Texaco agreed to merge on Oct 15 for $35 billion in stock and $7.5
billion in debt.
(SFC, 10/14/00, p.A1)(SFC, 10/16/00, p.A1)
2001 Mar 26, In Kazakhstan the
Caspian Pipeline Consortium began pumping crude oil from the Tengiz
field to Novorossiysk, Russia’s Black Sea port. The 990-mile
Tengiz-Novorossiysk oil pipeline was owned by Kazakhstan, Russia, Oman
and 8 oil companies. Chevron held 15% in the 12-partner consortium.
(WSJ, 2/26/01, p.A14)(SFC, 3/27/01, p.C4)
2001 cApr 5, Presidents Robert
Kocharian of Armenia and Heydar Aliyev of Azerbaijan met in Key West,
Fla., for negotiations on Nagorno-Karabakh. A new $2.7 billion oil
pipeline from Baku to Ceyhan, Turkey, was expected to pass just north
of the area. Halliburton Co., was a finalist in engineering bids for
the line and Vice President Chaney was the former chief executive of
Halliburton. National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice formerly served
on the Board of Directors for Chevron, a player in the pipeline bid.
(SFC, 4/4/01, p.A10)
2001 Jul 17, In Moscow Russia and
China agreed to plan a $1.7 billion pipeline for oil from Siberia to
northeastern China.
(SFC, 7/18/01, p.C4)
2001 Aug 20, Four oil companies
(Chevron, Shell, Texaco and Unocal) agreed to clean up MTBE
contamination in California caused by leaking storage tanks. 4 others
(ARCO, Exxon, Mobil and Tosco) declined to settle the suit.
(SFC, 8/21/01, p.A3)
2001 Sep 7, The Utah Attorney
General approved the merger of Chevron and Texaco.
(SFC, 10/20/04,
p.C6)(http://attorneygeneral.utah.gov/PrRel/prsept72001.htm)
2001 Dec, Oscar Wyatt (81),
chairman of Coastal Corp., agreed to a surcharge of about $200,000 to
be paid to bank account in Jordan controlled by officials of Iraq’s
State Oil Marketing Organization. This was in violation of the UN’s
oil-for-food program. Wyatt was arrested in 2005 at his home in
Houston. In 2007 Wyatt was sentenced to over a year in jail after
admitting approval of the surcharge.
(SFC, 10/22/05, p.A3)(WSJ, 11/28/07, p.B10)
2001-2003 Cuba ran up an oil debt to Venezuela of
some $752 million.
(WSJ, 2/2/04, p.A1)
2002 Feb, Royal Dutch/Shell
executives were advised that there were huge shortfalls in proven oil
and natural-gas reserves. The information was not made public for 2
years.
(SFC, 2/09/04, p.A1)
2002 Jul 19, In Abiteye, Nigeria,
unarmed women occupying at least four ChevronTexaco facilities took two
hostages in a bid to meet with oil executives.
(AP, 7/20/02)
2002 Aug 5, Shell Oil agreed to
pay $28 million to the Tahoe Public Utility District to help cleanup
contamination from the gasoline additive MTBE.
(SFC, 8/5/02, p.A17)
2002 The US Geological Survey
estimated there may be 1.9 trillion cubic feet of gas in the Marcellus
Shale of Pennsylvania. In 2008 Prof. Terry Engelder of Pennsylvania
State Univ. estimated the amount at 168 trillion cubic feet. US
consumption in 2007 was 23.05 trillion.
(WSJ, 4/2/08, p.A2)
2002 World oil production reached
nearly 67 million barrels per day.
(SSFC, 3/21/04, p.J3)
2002 China announced a $5.25
billion East-West natural gas project. A Western consortium backed out
in 2004.
(WSJ, 8/4/04, p.A11)
2003 Jan 17, Iraq and Russia
signed three oil agreements for exploration and development of oil
fields in southern and western Iraq.
(AP, 1/17/03)
2003 Jan 29, Belgium said oil
leaking from the sunken cargo ship Tricolor (Dec 14) is washing up on
the Belgian coastline, damaging wildlife and beaches.
(AP, 1/30/03)
2003 Feb 8, Tens of thousands of
Venezuelans marched in support of 9,000 oil workers fired for leading a
two-month strike against President Hugo Chavez that battered the
economy of this oil-dependent nation.
(AP, 2/8/03)
2003 Feb 15, Nigerian oil workers
launched an indefinite strike that could shut down crude exports in the
world’s 6th largest oil exporter.
(AP, 2/15/03)
2003 Feb 21, An explosion rocked a
Mobil oil refinery on the edge of Staten Island and 2 workers were
killed.
(AP, 2/21/03)
2003 Feb 21, It was reported that
Iraq had recently begun shipping large quantities of oil through its
Khor al Amaya port.
(WSJ, 2/21/03, p.A1)
2003 Feb 24, Dan Rather
interviewed Saddam Hussein via satellite and Hussein proposed a live
debate with Pres. Bush. Hussein said he would rather die than leave his
country and that he would not destroy its wealth by setting fire to its
oil wells in the event of a U.S.-led invasion.
(SFC, 2/25/03, A10)(AP, 2/26/03)
2003 Feb 25, In Nigeria cars and
buses ground to a halt in Africa’s leading oil-producing nation,
gripped by its worst fuel shortage since military rule ended four years
ago. Nigeria, with a population of 120 million people, consumes 300,000
barrels of crude oil daily. Panic buying followed a recent strike.
(AP, 2/25/03)
2003 Feb 26, In Guatemala
striking teachers seized a pumping station on the nation’s only oil
pipeline to press their demands for a hefty wage increase and better
schools. About 60,000 of the country’s 80,000 teachers are striking to
demand a near-doubling of salaries that now range from about $190 to
$390 per month. They also seek improved school buildings, more books
and better school lunches.
(AP, 2/27/03)
2003 Mar 8, In India separatist
rebels in northeastern Assam state shot and killed three laborers,
ignited a huge fire by launching mortars at an oil refinery and used
explosives to damage a pipeline.
(AP, 3/8/03)
2003 Mar 18, In Yemen a man shot 4
Hunt Oil company workers. He killed 3 and shot himself dead.
(SFC, 3/19/03, p.A5)
2003 Mar 19, Boatloads of Nigerian
troops headed into the oil-rich Niger Delta on to put down days of
ethnic violence that has left dozens dead and disrupted multinational
oil operations.
(AP, 3/20/03)(SFC, 3/21/03, p.A9)
2003 Mar 20, The US-led ground war
in Iraq began. US Sec. of State Rumsfeld warned that the attack in Iraq
would be “of a force and scope and scale that is beyond what has been
seen before.” A “shock and awe” strategy was planned based on a 1996
“rapid dominance” strategy. The US seized $1.74 billion in frozen Iraqi
assets and declared it would be used for humanitarian purposes. Iraq
set fire to at least 10 oil wells.
(AP, 3/20/03)(SFC, 3/20/03, p.W1)(SFC, 3/21/03,
p.W11)(WSJ, 3/21/03, p.A1)
2003 Mar 22, In Nigeria ethnic
militants threatened to blow up 11 multinational oil installations they
claimed to have captured in retaliation for military raids.
(AP, 3/22/03)
2003 Mar 27, EU governments agreed
to ban single-hulled oil tankers carrying heavy fuel in an attempt to
reduce the risk of slicks.
(AP, 3/27/03)
2003 Mar, Oil flow from Iraq to
Syria ceased with the US invasion. It had reached 130,000 barrels a day
providing both countries over $10 million a month in profits.
(SFC, 4/11/03, p.A18)
2003 Apr 1, In Nigeria the 12-day
rampage by Ijaw extremists has cut the normal oil output of 2 million
barrels a day by 40 percent. Nigeria is the fifth-biggest supplier of
US oil imports.
(AP, 4/1/03)
2003 Apr 3, The Venezuela
government fired 828 more employees from the state oil monopoly for
participating in a two-month strike to oust Pres. Chavez.
(AP, 4/4/03)
2003 Apr 10, In the 22nd day of
Operation Iraqi Freedom US and Kurdish troops seized oil-rich Kirkuk
without a fight and held a second city within their grasp as opposition
forces crumbled in northern Iraq. Looting in Baghdad prompted orders
for US Marines to crack down on thieves.
(AP, 4/10/03)(SFC, 4/11/03, p.A1)
2003 Aug 14, A Greek oil tanker
that ran aground Jul 27 off the port city of Karachi broke apart, but
officials said the worst was over and rich fishing grounds nearby were
not threatened. The ship carried 378,000 to 450,000 gallons. It leaked
an estimated 12,000 metric tons.
(AP, 8/14/03)(SFC, 8/15/03, p.A3)
2003 Oct 12, In Bolivia violence
erupted at El Alto when the military tried to break a blockade against
gas trucks bound for Chile. The death toll grew to 59 after 4 days of
clashes at El Alto.
(http://bolivia.indymedia.org/es/2003/10/3225.shtml)
(SFC, 10/15/03, p.A11)(Econ, 10/18/03, p.38)
2003 Oct 22, It was reported that
pirated fuel from Iraq totaled some 2,000 tons for a daily loss of
$250,000.
(SFC, 10/22/03, p.A1)
2003 Dec 5, A tractor in Tracy,
Ca., punctured a Chevron oil pipeline and over 21,000 gallons of oil
leaked out. Officials said the leak could exceed 40,000 gallons.
(SFC, 12/6/03, p.A17)
2003 Dec 30, The Russian Tax
Ministry slapped a $3.3 billion bill for back taxes, fines and other
penalties on the oil giant Yukos.
(SFC, 12/31/03, p.B6)
2003 Dec, George B. Kaiser, head
of Kaiser-Francis Oil, took over the LNG business of El Paso Oil. This
included the Energy Bridge technology for pumping natural gas from new,
specially-built off-shore vessels.
(WSJ, 7/23/04, p.A1)
2003 Oil insiders began to
consider that some 180 billion barrels of oil, trapped in the tar sands
of Alberta, were economically viable.
(Econ, 6/28/03, p.75)
2003 James Giffen, a US oil
consultant, was indicted in the US under the 1977 Foreign Corrupt
Practices Act. He was charged with accepting bribes from US companies
to gain access to Kazakhstan’s Tengiz oil field. Giffen claimed he was
working as a US intelligence asset.
(WSJ, 5/12/08, p.A6)
2003 British Petroleum bought half
of Russia’s Tyumen Oil Co. for $6.75 billion.
(Econ, 5/22/04, Survey p.11)
2004 Jan 9, Royal Dutch/Shell
announced that it overstated its proven reserves and planned to slash
estimates by 20%.
(WSJ, 4/20/04, p.A12)
2004 Jan 31, China’s oil-refining
boss signed a deal to buy crude oil from Gabon. Pres. Hu Jintao visited
Gabon the next day.
(Econ, 2/7/04, p.45)
2004 Feb 10, OPEC met in Algiers
and agreed to reduce its official production by 1 million barrels-a-day
beginning Apr 1. Current production was 24.5 million.
(WSJ, 2/11/04, p.A1)
2004 Feb 19, A Japanese consortium
announced it will develop an Iranian oil field with reserves of up to
26 billion barrels. The deal was opposed by the United States because
of fears the money could go to nuclear proliferation.
(AP, 2/19/04)
2004 Mar 3, Royal Dutch/Shell
announced the resignations of CEO Sir Philip Watts and Walter van de
Vijver, head of exploration and production.
(WSJ, 4/20/04, p.A12)
2004 Mar 22, Oil giant Royal
Dutch/Shell said it plans to streamline its operations in Nigeria. An
estimated 1,500 people, or about 30 percent of its work force of about
5,000, will be laid off.
(AP, 3/22/04)
2004 Mar 23, A Unocal helicopter
with 10 on board went missing in the Gulf of Mexico. The Coast Guard
found 4 bodies.
(WSJ, 3/25/04, p.A1)
2004 Mar 31, OPEC voted to cut oil
production by 4.1%.
(SFC, 4/1/04, p.C1)
2004 Apr 29, Cleanup crews arrived
at Suisun Marsh in the SF Bay area to tackle an estimated 60,000 gallon
diesel fuel spill from a pipeline operated by Kinder Morgan Energy
Partners of Houston, Texas. The amount of spill was later raised to
85,000 gallons.
(SFC, 4/30/04, p.A1)(SSFC, 5/30/04, p.B5)
2004 May 4, Oil prices for June
delivery rose to $38.98 a barrel.
(WSJ, 5/5/04, p.A1)
2004 May 10, Saudi oil ministers
called on OPEC to pump more oil.
(SFC, 5/11/04, p.A1)
2004 May 11, Oil for June delivery
rose to 40.06 per barrel, the highest price in 13 years.
(SFC, 5/12/04, p.A1)
2004 May 15, In Jordan a three-day
World Economic Forum began. Augusto Lopez-Claros, chief economist and
director of the Global Competitiveness Program in the World Economic
Forum, said "oil will remain a source of instability in the world, and
perhaps in the short-term it is the most significant factor."
(AP, 5/14/04)(AP, 5/15/04)
2004 May 17, China and Kazakhstan
agreed to build a 744-mile crude oil pipeline to send an initial 10
million tons of Kazakh oil to Xinjiang by 2006.
(WSJ, 6/17/04, p.A16)
2004 Jun 3, In Beirut, Lebanon,
OPEC leaders agreed to raise their output ceiling by 2.5 million
barrels a day.
(WSJ, 6/4/04, p.A2)
2004 Jul 2, A Norwegian strike
began targeting the oil exploration sector. It incidentally affected
two mobile production units, the Petrojarl I, which ceased operations
in early September, and the Petrojarl Varg.
(AP, 10/13/04)
2004 Jul 4, It was reported that
Libya's state-owned Tam Oil Co has bought the Niger unit of US oil
major ExxonMobil Corp, in the first such deal following an end to US
sanctions on Tripoli.
(AP, 7/4/04)
2004 Aug 9, Oil prices for
September delivery of light crude hit a record high of $44.98 since
trading began in NYC in 1983.
(SFC, 8/10/04, p.A1)
2004 Aug 18, Indian shares slid as
oil prices surged to a new high of $47 a barrel, threatening domestic
demand and growth in Asia's fourth-largest economy.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 30, Mexico’s state oil
company said it believes that vast untapped oil reserves lie in the
deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico.
(WSJ, 8/31/04, p.A10)
2004 Sep 14, Hurricane Ivan
whipped western Cuba with 160 mph winds. The hurricane knocked some 25
million barrels of oil off world markets by causing undersea mudslides
in the Gulf of Mexico.
(AP, 9/14/04)(WSJ, 10/27/04, p.A1)
2004 Sep 29, In a deal paving the
way for future joint ventures, U.S. oil giant ConocoPhillips has won an
auction with a bid of nearly $2 billion US for the Russian government's
7.6 per cent stake in Russia's Lukoil - the world's No. 2 oil company
by reserves.
(AP, 9/29/04)
2004 Sep, Construction began on a
620-mile pipeline to take oil from eastern Kazakhstan into China’s
western Xinjiang region.
(Econ, 11/13/04, p.46)
2004 Oct 5, Light crude oil for
November closed at a record $51.09 per barrel.
(SFC, 10/6/04, p.C1)
2004 Oct 6, Light crude oil for
November closed in NYC at a record $52.02 per barrel.
(SFC, 10/6/04, p.C1)
2004 Oct 7, Light crude oil for
November closed in NYC at a record $52.67 per barrel.
(WSJ, 10/8/04, p.C1)
2004 Oct 11, Light crude oil for
November closed in NYC at a record $53.64 per barrel.
(SFC, 10/12/04, p.E12)
2004 Oct 14, Light crude oil for
November closed in NYC at a record $54.76 per barrel.
(SFC, 10/15/04, p.C1)
2004 Nov 25, In Singapore China
Aviation Oil (Singapore) filed for bankruptcy protection following an
estimated loss of $550 million from a series of bets on oil prices.
(WSJ, 12/6/04, p.A1)
2004 Nov 26, A Cyprus-registered
tanker spilled 30,000 gallons of crude oil into the Delaware River
between Philadelphia and southern New Jersey, creating a 20-mile-long
slick that killed dozens of birds and threatened other wildlife.
(AP, 11/28/04)
2004 Dec 5, In Nigeria hundreds of
protesters besieged two oil platforms run by Royal Dutch/Shell Group
Cos. and ChevronTexaco Corp. in the southern oil region, shutting down
production of 90,000 barrels of oil a day.
(AP, 12/6/04)
2004 Dec 7, The German-registered
MSC Ilona was punctured during a collision night with the
Panama-registered Hyundai Advance near the mouth of the Pearl River,
northwest of Hong Kong. The collision of the container ships caused a
huge oil spill and cleanup effort.
(AP, 12/9/04)
2004 Dec 10, OPEC agreed to reduce
output by one million barrels a day in hopes of staving off further
price declines without triggering a new buying frenzy.
(AP, 12/10/04)
2004 Dec 19, Russia's little-known
BaikalFinansGroup bought Yuganskneftegaz, the core production unit of
oil giant Yukos, at auction for $9.3 billion US.
(AP, 12/19/04)(Econ, 1/1/05, p.49)
2004 Dec 25, President Fidel
Castro said a 100-million-barrel crude oil deposit had been discovered
off Cuba by Canadian firms. Cuba imports about half the petroleum it
needs.
(AP, 12/25/04)
2004 Dec 28, Albania, Bulgaria and
Macedonia gave political support to a $1.2 billion private trans-Balkan
pipeline that will allow Russian and Caspian crude oil to avoid Turkish
waters.
(WSJ, 12/29/04, p.A7)
2004 Dec 30, Russia said it would
form a new state oil company base on the core operations of Yukos and
that it would offer a minority stake to China.
(WSJ, 12/31/04, p.A1)
2004 The new Iraqi government
priced local petrol at one American cent per liter. The policy caused
severe shortages as large amounts leaked over to the black market where
prices were significantly higher.
(Econ, 12/18/04, p.64)
2004 David Goodstein authored "Out
of Gas: The End of the Age of Oil."
(SSFC, 2/22/04, p.M6)
2004 Michael T. Klare authored
“Blood and Oil: The Dangers and Consequences of America’s Growing
Dependency on Imported Petroleum.”
(SSFC, 9/11/04, p.M1)
2004 Stephen and Donna Leeb
authored “The Oil Factor” and claimed that the price of oil will soar
above $100 per barrel by the end of the decade.
2004 Amory Lovins, head of the
Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI), authored “Winning the Oil Endgame.”
Lovins offered a plan for reducing US oil use by 50% by 2025, and
ending foreign oil dependency based on a study funded by the Pentagon.
(www.amazon.com/Winning-Oil-Endgame-Amory-Lovins/dp/1881071103)
(Econ, 3/20/04,
p.62)(www.financialsense.com/fsu/posts/dancy/reviews/030904.html)
2004 Peter R. Odell authored “Why
Carbon Fuels Will Dominate the 21st Century’s Global Energy Economy.
(Econ, 10/9/04, p.77)
2004 Matthew Yeomans authored
“Oil: Anatomy of an Industry.”
(SSFC, 9/11/04, p.M1)
2005 Jan 12, Nigeria made public
plans to build a second $6-billion liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant in
the southwestern state of Ondo.
(AFP, 1/13/05)
2005 Jan 21, The US Bureau of Land
Management (BLM) posted a decision to open thousands of acres on
Alaska’s North Slope for exploratory oil drilling.
(SFC, 1/22/05, p.A5)
2005 Jan 29, Libya granted its
first oil exploration licenses in over four decades, awarding 15
permits to foreign companies, with US companies taking the lion's
share. PM Shukri Ghanem said Libya has opted for a policy of open
communication with total transparence."
(AP, 1/29/05)
2005 Jan 30, OPEC warned that oil
prices, already hovering near $50 a barrel, would remain high through
the spring, even as the cartel decided to keep its production ceiling
at 27 million barrels a day.
(AP, 1/30/05)
2005 Feb 1, China lent Russia $6
billion to help finance the nationalization of OAO Yukos. The loan was
in effect a forward payment for some 48 million metric tons of crude
oil.
(WSJ, 2/2/05, p.A2)
2005 Feb 1, Venezuela’s Pres.
Chavez said he intends to sell his country’s interests in 8 US oil
refineries.
(WSJ, 2/2/05, p.A2)
2005 Feb 15, It was reported that
major energy firms had committed $20 billion to build a new
gas-to-liquids (GTL) plant in Qatar to develop the huge natural gas
reserves there.
(WSJ, 2/15/05, p.A1)
2005 Mar 4, President Hugo Chavez
said Venezuela wants to supply crude oil to India, Asia's third-biggest
consumer, under a long-term agreement.
(AP, 3/4/05)
2005 Mar 11, Crude oil futures
prices climbed over $54 a barrel after the Int’l. Energy Agency
estimated global petroleum demand would grow faster than previously
expected in 2005.
(AP, 3/13/05)
2005 Mar 12, Algeria's minister
for energy and mines said OPEC has reached its production limit, and
trying to stretch output by one million barrels per day isn't likely to
lower oil prices.
(AP, 3/12/05)
2005 Mar 12, Turkish authorities
closed the Bosphorus Strait to maritime traffic after a
roll-on-roll-off (ro-ro) vessel carrying 7 tanker trucks loaded with
138 tons of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) sank in the narrow waterway,
which separates the European and Asian sides of Istanbul.
(AP, 3/13/05)
2005 Apr 1, Oil prices closed on
Nymex at a record $57.27 per barrel sending the DJIA down 99 points to
10,404.
(SFC, 4/2/05, p.A1)
2005 Apr 4, Oil prices hit an
intraday high of $58.28 per barrel.
(SFC, 4/5/05, p.C1)
2005 Apr 4, Chevron announced
plans to purchase Unocal Corp. for $18.4 billion. Chevron’s eventual
acquisition of Unocal included a stake in the Yadana project in
Myanmar, in which Unocal invested in the 1990s along with France’s
Total, Myanmar Oil and Gas Enterprise and the petroleum Authority of
Thailand. Total with a 31% stake operated the project. The Yadana
project brought in an estimated $969 million to the government
undercutting international sanctions to isolate the regime.
(SFC, 4/5/05, p.A1)(SFC, 10/4/07, p.A10)(SFC,
4/29/08, p.D3)
2005 Apr 8, ChevronTexaco Corp.
said it has awarded a $1.7 billion contract to build Nigeria's third
natural gas-to-liquids plant to a consortium including Halliburton Co.
subsidiary KBR.
(AP, 4/8/05)
2005 Apr 29, In Canada oil
companies stopped all engineering work on a natural gas pipeline from
the Arctic ocean to the oil sands of Alberta, due to high compensation
demands by the Deh Cho First Nation native Indian tribe in Fort
Simpson, Northwest Territories. The Deh Cho also sought a new
autonomous government and complete ownership of subsurface rights
within their 81,000 square mile claim, an area about the size of
Nebraska.
(SFC, 5/23/05, p.A1)
2005 Apr, Unocal agreed to settle
a lawsuit, for an undisclosed sum, concerning human rights abuses on
the Yadana project in Myanmar.
(SFC, 4/29/08, p.D1)
2005 May 5, It was reported that
Wolverine Gas & Oil of Grand Rapids, Mich., had snapped up leasing
rights to a half-million acres in central Utah and estimated yields up
to a billion or more barrels of oil.
(SFC, 5/5/05, p.C3)
2005 May 17, In Bolivia a measure
increasing taxes on foreign oil companies became law. It slapped a 32%
production tax on top of royalties of 18% paid by producers of natural
gas and oil. The president and thousands of street protesters wanted
the industry nationalized.
(AP, 5/18/05)(Econ, 5/21/05, p.42)
2005 May 17, In Vietnam an
international consortium led by French group Technip signed a
1.5-billion-dollar deal to build Vietnam's first oil refinery.
(AP, 5/17/05)
2005 Jun 15, OPEC agreed to
increase its production quota by half a million barrels a day in an
effort to cool high crude oil costs that have dampened the global
economy.
(AP, 6/15/05)
2005 Jun 17, Crude oil prices for
July delivery hit a record high closing at $58.47 a barrel.
(AP, 6/18/05)(SFC, 6/18/05, p.C1)
2005 Jun 24, Crude oil, at close
to $60 a barrel, caused widespread selling on global equity markets, as
shares in transport and automobile companies fell sharply.
(AP, 6/24/05)
2005 Jun 25, Gujarat's chief
minister said Gujarat Petroleum Corp (GSPC) has made the India’s
biggest gas discovery 20 trillion cubic feet, worth $50 billion off the
southeast coast.
(AP, 6/26/05)
2005 Jun 28, China said it will
begin filling its strategic oil reserve by the end of the year.
(WSJ, 6/29/05, p.A13)
2005 Jun 30, Justice Minister Yuri
Chaika said that Russia was seeking to have assets of the beleaguered
Yukos oil company seized overseas and had asked Netherlands and
Lithuania for help.
(AP, 6/30/05)
2005 Jul 6, Crude oil for August
delivery rose $1.69 to settle at a record $61.28 per barrel.
(SFC, 7/7/05, p.C1)
2005 Jul 8, In China Exxon Mobil
Corp., Saudi Aramco and top Asian refiner Sinopec signed a $3.5 billion
deal to expand a refinery in south China, sealing what they called the
country's largest oil project.
(Reuters, 7/8/05)
2005 Oct 21, Oscar Wyatt (81),
former chairman of Coastal Corp., was arrested at his home in Houston
for paying millions in kickbacks to the government of Saddam Hussein in
exchange for rights to buy discounted Iraqi oil under the UN’s
oil-for-food program. 2 Swiss associates were also indicted. In 2007
Wyatt was sentenced to over a year in jail after admitting that he
agreed to a surcharge of about $200,000 to be paid to bank account in
Jordan controlled by officials of Iraq’s State Oil Marketing
Organization in Dec 2001.
(SFC, 10/22/05, p.A3)(WSJ, 11/28/07, p.B10)
2005 Oct 27, The 18-month
Independent Inquiry Committee under former US Federal Reserve chairman
Paul Volcker issued a final 623-page report on corruption in the UN
oil-for-food program. It claimed that between 1997 and 2003 the Iraqi
government sold $64 billion of oil to 248 companies and bought $34.5
billion worth of humanitarian goods. The report accused more than 2,200
companies from some 40 countries of colluding with Saddam's regime to
bilk the humanitarian program in Iraq of $1.8 billion.
(AP, 10/27/05)(Econ, 10/29/05, p.28)(AP, 1/26/08)
2005 Dec 11, In Britain a huge
inferno followed explosions at the Buncefield oil depot. 43 people were
injured. In 2009 a court said French oil giant Total must pay bills
valued at more than 750 million pounds for people whose homes and
businesses were damaged in the fire.
(http://tinyurl.com/chwzwb)(AFP, 3/20/09)
2005 Matthew R. Simmons authored
“Twilight in the Desert: The Coming Saudi Oil shock and the World
Economy.”
(WSJ, 6/28/05, p.D8)
2005 Members of the “peak-oil
movement” believed that by about this time humanity will have extracted
about half the oil that it would ever get.
(WSJ, 9/21/04, p.A1)
2006 Jul 7, Oil hit a fresh record
high of $75.78 a barrel, boosted by strong demand in the US and global
tension ranging from Iran's nuclear work to North Korea's missile tests.
(Reuters, 7/7/06)
2006 Aug 1, Cabinda, a 7,000 sq-km
province of Angola located on the western coast just north of the
CongoDRC, signed the “Memorandum of Understanding for Peace in Cabinda”
with the government of Angola, granting it “a special statute” and
greater autonomy. In 2007 the province pumped over half of Angola’s 1.7
million barrels per day oil production.
(Econ, 1/5/08, Angola p.8)
2006 Oct 15, Algerian Energy
Minister Chehib Khelil said that the Organization of Petroleum
Exporting Countries will announce a 1 million barrel a day cut in crude
production during a meeting in Qatar.
(AP, 10/15/06)
2006 Dec 12, Russia's Gazprom
closed in on half of Royal Dutch Shell's $22 billion Sakhalin-2 energy
project while Shell denied it had buckled under Kremlin pressure and
warned Moscow the world was watching.
(AP, 12/12/06)(WSJ, 12/12/06, p.A3)
2006 Dec 21, Royal Dutch Shell and
its partners agreed to hand over 50% plus one share of the Sakhalin II
oil and gas project to OAO Gazprom, the Russian state-controlled energy
firm, for $7.45 billion. Shell and its partners have already put $12
billion into the project, which was about 80% complete.
(WSJ, 12/22/06, p.A3)
2007 May 29, Libya said it will
sign a 900 million dollar exploration deal with energy giant BP, which
plans to return to the north African country after a 33 year absence.
(AP, 5/29/07)
2007 Jun 6, Los Angeles based
Colony Capital LLC, private investment firm, said it has agreed to buy
a controlling stake in Libyan state-owned Tamoil in a deal that valued
the Italy-based refiner at 4 billion euros ($5.4 billion), double
earlier estimates. Colony, founded in 1991 by Thomas Barrack, focuses
on real estate-related assets, securities, and operating companies. In
March, 2008, the deal was reported to be off.
(Reuters, 6/6/07)(Reuters, 3/3/08)
2007 Sep 12, Exxon Mobil Corp.
said in a filing with the SEC that it had filed a request with the
Int’l. Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes for arbitration
over compensation from the Venezuelan government for seized oil
production assets.
(WSJ, 9/14/07, p.A9)
2007 Sep 28, The United States
announced it would spend up to $25 million to pay for 50,000 tons of
heavy fuel oil for North Korea as part of an agreement to dismantle the
North’s nuclear program.
(AP, 9/28/08)
2007 Oct 10, Ministers from
Azerbaijan, Georgia, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine signed a deal to
build an oil pipeline linking the Black and Baltic seas.
(WSJ, 10/11/07, p.A18)
2007 Oct 16, Oil prices reached
another record high closing at 87.61 per barrel in the NY Mercantile
Exchange.
(SFC, 10/17/07, p.C1)
2007 Oct 23, At least 21 oil
workers were killed when a drilling rig hit an oil platform in stormy
weather, spilling gas and oil into the Gulf of Mexico. Pemex said the
workers who died included four Pemex employees, seven employees of the
subcontractor company that operated the rig, at least one rescue boat
crew member, and six others who worked for other companies. On Dec 16
Pemex announced that the well was finally capped. Roughly 420 barrels
of oil per day had spilled from the damaged platform since the accident.
(AP, 10/25/07)(AP, 12/16/07)
2007 Oct 29,
Oil prices closed at a record $93.53 per barrel on the NY
Mercantile Exchange.
(SFC, 10/30/07, p.C2)
2007 Nov 6, Crude oil prices hit a
record highs at $97.10 and closed at a record $96.70 per barrel on the
NY Mercantile Exchange.
(SFC, 11/7/07, p.C2)
2007 Nov 5, In Yemen unidentified
saboteurs bombed an oil pipeline in Marib province. The attack halted
the flow of oil and added to concerns in the world oil markets about
adequate supplies for heating fuel.
(AP, 11/8/07)
2007 Nov 8, Brazil’s Petrobras
reported the discovery of a large oil reserve with as much as 8 billion
barrels of crude. This represented about 3 months worth of current
world supply, with estimated use at 86 million barrels a day.
(WSJ, 11/9/07, p.A12)
2007 Nov 8, In Yemen tribesmen
attacked an oil installation and then clashed with government troops,
leaving 12 people dead. It was the second attack on the country's oil
industry this week.
(AP, 11/8/07)
2007 Nov 10, Iranian state
television reported that Iran and Pakistan have reached a deal to build
a multi-billion-dollar pipeline to transport natural gas between the
two countries.
(AP, 11/11/07)
2007 Nov 11, A severe storm broke
the Volganeft-139, a small Russian oil tanker, in two in the Strait of
Kerch, spilling at least 560,000 gallons of fuel into the strait
between the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea. A Russian official said it
was an "environmental disaster." 8 seamen were left missing. Two
freighters nearby also sank under 18-foot waves in storm. As many as 10
ships sank or ran aground in the area.
(AP, 11/11/07)(Reuters, 11/12/07)(SFC, 11/12/07,
p.A15)
2007 Nov 12, Alexander Tkachyov,
governor of Russia’s Krasnodar region, said more than 30,000 birds and
countless fish have been killed in an "ecological catastrophe" wrought
by thousands of tons of oil from a tanker that broke apart in a heavy
storm near the Black Sea. 3 bodies washed ashore and 20 sailors
remained missing after the sinking of at least 11 ships.
(AP, 11/12/07)(SFC, 11/13/07, p.A10)
2007 Nov 14, Chevron agreed to pay
$30 million to settle charges that it made illegal kickbacks to Iraq
for oil purchased in 2001 and 2002 under the UN oil-for-food program.
(SFC, 11/15/07, p.C1)
2007 Nov 20, Crude-oil futures
surged to a record high settling at $98.03 a barrel on the NY
Mercantile Exchange.
(WSJ, 11/21/07, p.C8)
2007 Dec 2, Robert O. Anderson
(b.1917), oil man and creator of the Atlantic Richfield Co. (1966),
died in Roswell, NM.
(WSJ, 12/8/07, p.A7)
2007 Dec 4, French oil group Total
said it had signed a deal to invest about 1.5 billion dollars in a new
3.0-billion-dollar (2.0 billion euros) petrochemical plant in Algeria.
(AFP, 12/4/07)
2007 Dec 10, Petro-Canada,
Canada's third largest oil and gas company, signed a $7 billion deal
with Libya's state-run National Oil Corp. to invest in exploration in
the North African nation.
(AP, 12/10/07)
2007 US federal officials alleged
that $84 million held in Swiss bank accounts stem from bribes paid by
US companies to Kazakhstan’s president and other top officials for
access to energy reserves. The money was frozen as an investigation
continued.
(WSJ, 5/12/08, p.A6)
2007 Italian Oil company ENI SpA
bought Burren Energy PLC, a small independent company that operates an
oil field in Turkmenistan. ENI from that point on was denied entry
visas by Turkmenistan, which was annoyed at not being consulted in the
deal.
(WSJ, 4/23/08, p.B8)
2007 Syria’s oil exports were
expected to almost cease by this time.
(SFEC, 1/25/98, p.A18)
2008 Jan 2, Oil futures hit an
intraday high of $100 per barrel and closed at a record $99.62.
(WSJ, 1/3/08, p.A1)
2008 Jan 4, The Zambian government
awarded a 1.2 billion dollar crude oil deal to a Kuwait firm to supply
over 1.4 million tons of oil to the southern African nation.
(AP, 1/5/08)
2008 Feb 4, Secretary-General Ban
Ki-moon said the UN has transferred $161 million from the defunct
oil-for-food program to a development program for Iraq.
(AP, 2/4/08)
2008 Feb 7, Libya’s National Oil
Corp and Indonesia signed a deal for the north African state to supply
the world's most populous Muslim nation with crude oil for the next 20
years.
(AFP, 2/7/08)
2008 Feb 10, President Hugo Chavez
threatened to cut off oil sales to the United States in an "economic
war" if Exxon Mobil Corp. wins court judgments to seize billions of
dollars in Venezuelan assets.
(AP, 2/10/08)
2008 Feb 17, Iran inaugurated its
first stock exchange for oil products and petrochemicals, in a bid to
become a major player in the global downstream industry.
(AFP, 2/17/08)
2008 Feb 28, In Ecuador a
landslide caused some 4,000 barrels of oil to spill from its main
pipeline contaminating Coca River.
(www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/03/02/america/LA-FIN-Ecuador-Pipeline.php)
2008 Mar 10, Crude oil futures
moved to another all-time high as April delivery for light, sweet crude
rose to $107.90 per barrel.
(WSJ, 3/11/08, p.C7)
2008 Mar 16, In France a pipe
ruptured while a tanker was being loaded at a Total refinery. Some
3,000 barrels of fuel oil leaked in and along the Loire River.
(AP, 3/18/08)
2008 Apr 8, In Mexico Pres.
Calderon said he would ease some bureaucratic barriers, and allow Pemex
to pay outside contractors a "bonus," not a percentage cut, for oil
found in deep-water reserves.
(AP, 4/9/08)
2008 Apr 14, Algeria, the world’s
4th largest gas exporter, said it will and stop signing long term gas
contracts and switch to shorter term ones.
(WSJ, 4/15/08, p.A14)
2008 Apr 14, In Brazil a top
energy official said a deep-water exploration area could contain as
much as 33 billion barrels of oil, an amount that would nearly triple
Brazil's reserves and make the offshore bloc the world's third-largest
known oil reserve.
(AP, 4/14/08)
2008 Apr 17, The May contract for
light sweet crude oil hit a trading record of $115.54 as the dollar
fell to a new low against the euro.
(AP, 4/18/08)
2008 Apr 17, Russian President
Vladimir Putin wrapped up his two-day visit with Libyan leader Moammar
Gadhafi by writing off $4.5 billion in Libyan debts in exchange for
multibillion-dollar deals for Russian companies.
(AP, 4/17/08)
2008 Apr 21,
A rebel group from Nigeria's oil producing Niger Delta said it
attacked two major oil pipelines there in what it called a message to
the United States to stop supporting "injustice" in the troubled region.
(AP, 4/21/08)
2008 Apr 21, Pirates in the Gulf
of Aden fired on a Japanese oil tanker, unleashing hundreds of gallons
of fuel into the sea. The attack took place 170 miles off the coast of
Yemen while the 150,000-ton tanker was heading to Saudi Arabia.
(AP, 4/21/08)
2008 Apr 21, Crude oil futures
settled at a record $117.48 per barrel.
(WSJ, 4/21/08, p.A1)
2008 Apr 22, Anglo-Dutch oil group
Shell reported output loss of 169,000 barrels per day following the
sabotage of its key supply pipelines in southern Nigeria.
(AP, 4/22/08)
2008 Apr 27, Hundreds of workers
at Scotland's only oil refinery began a 48-hour strike. This forced BP
PLC to shut a pipeline system that delivers almost a third of Britain's
North Sea oil.
(AP, 4/27/08)
2008 Apr 28, In Washington truck
drivers honked horns, waved placards and shouted through bullhorns at
the Capitol to protest rising fuel prices they say are hurting their
livelihood.
(AP, 4/29/08)
2008 Apr 29, Workers returned to
the Grangemouth refinery in central Scotland after a 48-hour strike
that forced the closure of a major North Sea pipeline system.
(AP, 4/29/08)
2008 Apr 30, Syncrude Canada's
operations were under investigation by environmental regulators after
as many as 500 birds landed in the waste water in the oil sands region
of northern Alberta.
(Reuters, 5/1/08)
2008 May 1, It was reported that
Iran has stopped using dollars for oil deals as it seeks to reduce
reliance on the US.
(WSJ, 5/1/08, p.A1)
2008 May 3, Rebels in Nigeria's
oil-rich Niger Delta blew up three oil wells operated by Royal Dutch
Shell, their fifth attack in recent weeks against the petroleum
industry.
(AP, 5/3/08)
2008 May 5, Oil futures hit a
trading record of $120.36 before closing at a record $119.97.
(SFC, 5/6/08, p.D1)
2008 May 7, Oil closed at a record
high with light, sweet crude settling at $123.53 per barrel on the New
York Mercantile Exchange.
(SFC, 5/8/08, p.C5)
2008 May 9, A newly disclosed set
of documents that Colombia's government says were recovered on March 1
from a slain rebel's computers indicate senior Venezuelan officials
tried to help arm Colombia's main guerrilla army. The price of crude
rose above US$126 a barrel for the first time as investors questioned
whether a Wall Street Journal report regarding the documents could lead
to a confrontation between Washington and Venezuela.
(AP, 5/10/08)
2008 May 10, Oil major Royal Dutch
Shell said it was losing the equivalent of 30,000 barrels of crude oil
per day because of recent attacks against its installations in Nigeria.
(AP, 5/10/08)
2008 May 9, Oil closed at a record
high with light, sweet crude settling at $125.96 per barrel on the New
York Mercantile Exchange.
(WSJ, 5/10/08, p.B4)
2008 May 14, US federal
prosecutors said Willbros Group Inc., a Houston-based oil services
company, agreed to pay $32.3 million in criminal and civil penalties to
settle charges that it bribed officials in Nigeria and Ecuador to get
contracts between 2003-2005.
(WSJ, 5/15/08, p.B2)
2008 May 16, Under pressure from
Congress the US Energy Dept. said it would temporarily suspend filling
the US strategic oil stocks. Oil futures rose to a record $126.29 on
the NY Mercantile Exchange. Pres. Bush signed a bill to stop the
filling on May 19.
(SFC, 5/17/08, p.C1)(WSJ, 5/20/08, p.A1)
2008 May 21, Hundreds of French
fishermen clashed with police in Paris and severely disrupted
cross-Channel traffic as they stepped up a 10-day-old protest against
soaring fuel costs.
(AFP, 5/21/08)
2008 May 21, In Indonesia
thousands of students took to the streets across the country to protest
the government's plan to raise fuel prices.
(AP, 5/21/08)
2008 May 21, American Airlines
said it will remove 75 of 954 aircraft in its fleet and start charging
some domestic passengers $15 to check a suitcase due to rising fuel
costs. Oil futures closed at a record $133.17.
(SFC, 5/22/08, p.C1)(WSJ, 5/22/08, p.A1)
2008 May 26, Rebels from Nigeria's
oil-producing Niger Delta said they had blown up a Royal Dutch Shell
pipeline and killed 11 soldiers in a firefight, but the army denied
losing any men.
(Reuters, 5/26/08)
2008 Jun 3, A Cabinet minister
said Malaysia will remove price controls on gasoline and diesel,
allowing stations to sell fuel at world market prices in an attempt to
reduce the government's ballooning subsidy bill.
(AP, 6/3/08)
2008 Jun 4, An undetermined amount
of fuel oil was released after the Greece-registered Syros slammed
against the Malta-registered Sea Bird near Montevideo, Uruguay.
(AP, 6/5/08)
2008 Jun 6, Crude oil settled up
$10.75 at a record $138.54 on the NY Mercantile Exchange.
(WSJ, 6/7/08, p.A1)
2008 Jun 8, G8 leaders meeting in
Japan pledged to fight skyrocketing energy prices by increasing
efficiency and accelerating investment in new technologies, while
urging producers to expand production.
(AP, 6/8/08)
2008 Jun 10, XTO Energy said it
will buy closely held Hunt Petroleum for $4.19 billion.
(WSJ, 6/11/08, p.B1)
2008 Jun 11, In Thailand thousands
of truckers went on a half-day strike demanding government help against
rising fuel prices, the latest in a series of protests that have swept
across Asia and Europe.
(Reuters, 6/11/08)
2008 Jun 18, In Belgium hundreds
of farmers, truckers and taxi drivers blocked roads in and around
Brussels on the eve of an EU summit to push leaders for help coping
with skyrocketing fuel prices.
(AP, 6/18/08)
2008 Jun 19, China’s government
raised its base price for gasoline by 17% and 18% for diesel in an
effort to diminish the nation’s appetite for fuel.
(WSJ, 6/19/08, p.A1)
2008 Jun 19, Nigeria's most
prominent militant group claimed responsibility for an attack on
Shell's main offshore oilfield and said it had kidnapped a US oil
worker. The attack shut down a tenth of the country's oil output in a
rare attack on a deepwater facility. The Movement for the Emancipation
of the Niger Delta (MEND) said US captain Jack Stone from oil services
company Tidex was freed in the afternoon.
(AFP, 6/19/08)(Reuters, 6/19/08)
2008 Jun 25, The US Supreme Court
overturned the $2.5 billion in punitive damages that Exxon Mobil Corp
had been ordered to pay for the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill off Alaska.
(AP, 6/25/08)
2008 Jun 26, Cuts in Haitian
gasoline subsidies pushed the price of fuel to $6.14 a gallon, further
burdening the people as the government redirected money to other
programs.
(AP, 6/27/08)
2008 Jun 30, Crude oil futures hit
a record intraday high of $143.67 before closing at $140.
(WSJ, 7/1/08, p.C16)
2008 Jul 9, In Peru tens of
thousands of union workers took to the streets across the country to
protest rising food and fuel prices they blame on the free market
policies of President Alan Garcia.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 10, Nigeria's main
militant group said it would resume attacks in the country's oil-rich
river delta region because of Britain's recent pledge to back the
government in the conflict there. UN special envoy Ibrahim Gambari
resigned as chairman of a planned peace summit for the oil-rich Niger
Delta following opposition from regional leaders.
(AP, 7/10/08)(AFP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, Iraq's Oil Ministry
said that it is close to signing contracts to build two new oil
refineries in southern Iraq. Turkey's PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan became
the first Turkish leader to visit Iraq in nearly 20 years.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 11, Oil prices touched
$147 a barrel before beginning a decline.
(Econ, 8/9/08, p.70)
2008 Jul 12, President Hugo Chavez
said that he is expanding his Venezuela's Petrocaribe oil-supply pact
to include Guatemala.
(AP, 7/13/08)
2008 Jul 13, Algeria’s government
newspaper El Moudjhaid said a consortium of British-based oil services
company Petrofac and Indonesian engineering company IKPT provisionally
won a contract to build an LNG plant in western Mediterranean port of
Arzew.
(AP, 7/13/08)
2008 Jul 13, Iranian state TV said
the country is exploring a newly discovered oil field believed to
contain more than 1 billion barrels of crude oil.
(AP, 7/13/08)
2008 Jul 15, Fishermen across
Japan went on a massive one-day strike to protest skyrocketing fuel
prices, the latest blow to the country's foundering fishing industry.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, The EU agreed to an
emergency aid package for its fishing industry to cope with fuel prices.
(WSJ, 7/17/08, p.A8)
2008 Jul 17, Nigerian villagers
blew up a key crude oil supply pipeline operated by Agip, the Nigerian
subsidiary of Italian group Eni, cutting production.
(AFP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 23, In Louisiana an oil
tanker and an oil barge collided near New Orleans creating a 12-mile
oil slick and closing almost 100 miles of the Mississippi River. Over
400,000 gallons of fuel spilled into the river.
(SFC, 7/24/08, p.A3)(SFC, 7/25/08, p.A2)
2008 Jul 23, Nigeria's main
militant group threatened to destroy the nation's major oil pipelines
within 30 days to counter allegations it had struck a $12 million deal
with the government to protect them.
(AP, 7/23/08)
2008 Jul 23, Venezuela signed over
three more oil fields to a joint venture with Belarus, with Venezuelan
President Hugo Chavez declaring that the two nations were strongly
united in their resistance to "US imperialism" and Washington's
"lackeys."
(AP, 7/23/08)
2008 Jul 24, Ten insurgents and
two Cameroonian soldiers were killed in a rebel attack in the oil-rich
Bakassi peninsula. The rebels, who call themselves the Niger Delta
Defense and Security Council, oppose Cameroon's ownership of the West
African peninsula, which is also claimed by Nigeria.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 27, Mexico City residents
voted against the president's proposal to give private companies a
bigger role in the country's state-run oil industry in a nonbinding
referendum.
(AP, 7/28/08)
2008 Jul 31, Exxon Mobil Corp.
reported second-quarter earnings of $11.68 billion, the biggest
quarterly profit ever by any US corporation, but the results were well
short of Wall Street expectations and its shares fell.
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Aug 4, A Nigerian
presidential panel on oil and gas sector reform recommended that the
state oil company be transformed into an "independent limited liability
company."
(AFP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 5, The US General
Accounting Office predicted Iraq could finish the year with as much as
a $79 billion cumulative budget surplus due to the influx of oil
revenues. The GAO estimated that Iraqi oil revenues from 2005 through
the end of this year will amount to at least $156 billion.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 5, In Turkey an oil
pipeline that has allowed the West to tap the rich fields of
Azerbaijan, bypassing Iran and Russia, was set on fire. A Kurdish rebel
organization later admitted sabotaging the pipeline.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 12, Nigerian militants
claimed they had destroyed a pipeline supplying gas to a key oil
refinery in southern Rivers state.
(AFP, 8/12/08)
2008 Aug 27, China and Iraq signed
a $3 billion deal revising a prewar agreement for China's biggest oil
company to help develop the Ahdab oil field. On Sep 2 Iraq’s Cabinet
approved the deal with China National Petroleum Corp.
(AP, 8/28/08)(AP, 9/2/08)
2008 Sep 2, South Africa planned
to sign an energy agreement with oil-rich Venezuela as President Hugo
Chavez arrived on his first state visit. Political, trade and economic
relations were on the agenda with President Thabo Mbeki.
(AFP, 9/2/08)
2008 Sep 9, The Iraqi oil ministry
said Anglo-Dutch energy giant Royal Dutch Shell has agreed to a gas
joint venture with Iraq worth up to four billion dollars, becoming the
first Western oil major to gain access to the violence-wracked
country's vast energy reserves.
(AP, 9/9/08)
2008 Sep 9, OPEC ministers decided
to scale back production by some 520,000 barrels a day in the face of
falling oil prices and slowing demand. Hours earlier Russia proposed
extensive cooperation with OPEC.
(WSJ, 9/10/08, p.A7)
2008 Sep 9, Serbian lawmakers
ratified a pre-membership agreement with the EU and an oil and gas deal
with Russia after months of heated debate over the direction of the
country's policies.
(AP, 9/9/08)
2008 Sep 10, An internal
government report said US Interior Department employees in Denver and
Washington, who oversaw oil drilling on federal lands, had sex and used
illegal drugs with workers at energy companies where they were
conducting official business.
(AP, 9/11/08)
2008 Sep 11, James Ashley Nasmyth
(b.1918), English oil journalist, died. In 1979 he launched Argus
Telex, the first daily oil market report.
(www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article4827314.ece)(WSJ,
9/27/08, p.A16)
2008 Sep 15, Oil prices plunged to
a seven-month low as the Gulf Coast energy infrastructure appeared
relatively unharmed after Hurricane Ike and traders bet that Lehman
Brothers' bankruptcy could ignite a massive liquidation of commodities.
Oil closed at $95.71, its first close below $100 since March 4.
(AP, 9/15/08)(WSJ, 9/16/08, p.A12)
2008 Sep 16, In Nigeria militants
destroyed the Orubiri flow station operated by the Shell Petroleum
Development Company in Rivers state. The next day MEND said it killed
all the soldiers on guard at the facility and took their weapons.
(AFP, 9/17/08)
2008 Sep 17, Armed Nigerian
militants, who have declared an "oil war" in the restive south of the
country, claimed to have blown up a major pipeline in their latest
attack on oil installations in the region. A spokesman for Nigeria's
state oil company said that militant attacks are now cutting the
country's daily oil production by about 1 million barrels a day, 40
percent of what the country produced before the militant campaign began
three years ago.
(AP, 9/17/08)
2008 Sep 18, MEND militants in
southern Nigeria, as part of their "oil war," claimed to have destroyed
a major oil pipeline belonging to Royal Dutch Shell in the fifth attack
on the company in less than a week.
(AP, 9/19/08)
2008 Sep 19, Nigerian militants
destroyed another major oil pipeline in the Niger Delta after a week of
the most intense attacks against Africa's biggest oil and gas industry
for years.
(Reuters, 9/20/08)
2008 Sep 21, In southern Nigeria
MEND declared a ceasefire following a week of attacks on oil industry
targets.
(AFP, 9/21/08)
2008 Sep 22, The price of oil
jumped $16.37 to $120.92 per barrel, its biggest single-day gain ever,
as the dollar posted its worst single-day percentage drop. During this
final day for the October contract, oil had soared to as high as $130
per barrel.
(SFC, 9/23/08, p.D1)(WSJ, 9/23/08, p.C2)(Econ,
9/27/08, p.90)
2008 Sep 22, Iraq and Royal Dutch
Shell PLC signed a deal to establish a joint venture that will tap
natural gas in southern Iraq. A mortar round apparently aimed at an
Iraqi military base missed its target and slammed into a house in
northwestern Baghdad, killing one man and wounding four others. A car
bomb struck a mainly Shiite area in central Baghdad. Police said two
men and a woman were killed and seven people wounded.
(AP, 9/22/08)
2008 Sep 23, Venezuelan President
Hugo Chavez arrived in China to hold talks with his counterpart Hu
Jintao and sign a deal for combat aircraft in a visit likely to irk the
US. Chavez said Venezuela and China agreed to jointly build 2 oil
refineries, one in each country.
(AP, 9/23/08)(WSJ, 9/24/08, p.A25)
2008 Sep 29, The US House of
Representatives rejected the Bush administration’s $700 billion
emergency rescue plan. Democrats voted 140 to 90 in favor, while
Republicans voted 133-65 against the plan. The Dow Jones industrial
average lost 777.68 points, its biggest single-day fall ever, easily
beating the 684 points it lost on the first day of trading after the
Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Crude oil futures closed down $10.52
in their biggest decline since Jan 17, 1991, when the US opened
strategic oil reserves during the first Gulf war.
(AP, 9/29/08)(SFC, 9/30/08, p.A1)(WSJ, 9/30/08,
p.C8)(Econ, 10/4/08, p.30)
2008 Oct 5, Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala
Development Co. and Texas-based ConocoPhillips said they have signed a
deal with Kazakhstan’s national oil company to drill in a potentially
lucrative region in the Caspian Sea.
(SFC, 10/6/08, p.D1)
2008 Oct 9, The Libyan oil company
Tamoil said the Libyan government has again decided to halt oil
deliveries to Switzerland.
(AFP, 10/9/08)
2008 Oct 10, Global stocks dove
head first to five-year lows at the end of a brutal week as even the
traditional safe-havens of gold and government bonds suffered as
fear-stricken investors sought refuge in cash. The DJIA fell 128 to
close at 8451.19 in its most volatile day ever. Oil on the NY
mercantile Exchange fell over 10% to close at $77.70 a barrel, its
lowest level in over a year.
(Reuters, 10/10/08)(SFC, 10/11/08, p.C1)
2008 Oct 10, The Libyan news
agency JANA said Libya will withdraw $7 billion of assets in Swiss
banks, cut economic ties with Switzerland and stop supplying it with
oil to protest against poor treatment of Libyan diplomats and
businessmen.
(AP, 10/10/08)
2008 Oct 13, Iraq's oil minister
met 34 oil company representatives in London to set out the ground
rules for foreign multinationals' first bite at the country's enormous
energy reserves since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.
(AP, 10/13/08)
2008 Oct 15, The Shell Anglo-Dutch
group said a Nigerian court has ordered it to hand over land around its
giant Bonny oil terminal to the local population, a key demand of armed
rebels in the volatile region. Shell said ruling was given some months
ago but we have appealed.
(AFP, 10/15/08)
2008 Oct 17, George M Keller
(b.1923), former head of Standard Oil of California (1981-1988), died
at his home in Palo Alto, Ca. He oversaw the 1984 merger with Gulf Oil
to form Chevron Corp.
(SFC, 10/18/08, p.B1)
2008 Oct 24, OPEC said at an
emergency meeting that it will slash oil production by 1.5 million
barrels to stem the "dramatic collapse" of oil prices, but crude prices
plunged 7 percent anyway as financial markets spiraled downward across
the globe.
(AP, 10/24/08)
2008 Oct 31, Petrofac evacuated 56
non-essential workers from the North Sea Heather Alpha oil rig after a
reports of 10-20 ton oil spill.
(AP, 10/31/08)
2008 Oct 31, Brazil's state-run
oil company signed an agreement to explore for oil in deep Caribbean
waters north of Cuba that officials in Havana say could contain 20
billion barrels of crude.
(AP, 10/31/08)
2008 Nov 7, An environmentalist
group and four Nigerians filed suit against Royal Dutch Shell PLC in
the Netherlands, claiming the company was negligent in cleaning up oil
spills in Nigeria.
(AP, 11/7/08)
2008 Nov 10, Iraq and China signed
the final agreement on a $3 billion deal to develop the Ahdab oil field
south of Baghdad over a 22 year-period.
(AP, 11/11/08)
2008 Nov 14, In Nigeria 22
Filipinos were arrested by a joint army-navy patrol on the Warri River
with the vessel MT Akuada laden with its cargo of 12,500 metric tons of
crude oil. On Feb 20, 2009, 13 Filipinos were sentenced to five years
each or a fine of one million naira (6,800 dollars) for stealing crude
oil from the Niger delta.
(AFP, 2/21/09)
2008 Nov 15, Gunmen hijacked a
freighter with 23 crew off the coast of Somalia. The crew of the
Japanese-owned Chemstar Venus consisted of five South Koreans and 18
Filipinos. Somali pirates hijacked the Sirius Star, a newly
commissioned supertanker, more than 450 nautical miles southeast of
Mombasa, Kenya, along with its 25-member crew. The ship, owned by Saudi
oil company Aramco, was capable of carrying about 2 million barrels of
oil.
(AP, 11/16/08)(AP, 11/17/08)
2008 Nov 20, US oil group Chevron
suspended export contracts on much of its Nigerian production after a
militant attack on a key pipeline. Chevron said it was declaring "force
majeure" until December 31 following the Nov 14 attack on the pipeline
which carries supplies to its Escravos terminal in the Niger Delta.
(AFP, 11/20/08)
2008 Nov 20, Vietnam's president
Nguyen Minh Triet was set to meet Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, during
the first visit by a head of state from the communist nation here,
mainly focused on oil and gas ties.
(AP, 11/20/08)
2008 Dec 1, A federal jury in SF
cleared Chevron Corp. of responsibility for any human rights abuses
during a violent protest on a company oil platform in Nigeria a decade
ago.
(AP, 12/2/08)
2008 Dec 17, OPEC, meeting in
Algeria, said it is cutting 2.2 million barrels a day from its output,
the largest ever at one time, to stem crude prices that have plummeted
over 70% from summer highs of nearly $150. Members among the 13-nation
organization were officially producing a daily 29.045 million barrels
in September.
(AP, 12/17/08)
2008 Dec 26, China National
Offshore Oil Corp., the country's largest offshore oil and gas
producer, signed four oil cooperation agreements with Taiwan's CPC Corp.
(AP, 12/26/08)
2008 Dec 30, Libya asked oil
companies to slash production by 270,000 barrels per day from Jan. 1,
the latest such reduction by an OPEC member as the producer group
struggles to boost faltering oil prices.
(AP, 12/30/08)
2008 Dec 30, Russia's natural gas
company Gazprom said it will stop energy shipments to Ukraine and
sharply raise the price for future deliveries if it doesn't pay a $2
billion debt by New Year's Eve.
(AP, 12/30/08)
2008 Dec 31, In Iraq Oil Minister
Hussein al-Shahristani kicked off the country's second postwar bidding
round, naming 11 oil and gas fields or groups of fields as eligible for
development proposals. 8 people were killed in four bombings in the
north. At least 314 US soldiers died in 2008, down from 904 in 2007.
(AP, 12/31/08)(AP, 1/1/09)
2008 Dec, Tanganyika Oil was
acquired by a subsidiary of China Petroleum & Chemical Corp.
(Sinopec) for $2 billion.
(Econ, 6/27/09, p.72)
2009 Jan 2, Ukraine sought support
in European capitals a day after Russia cut off gas supplies and
hardened its stance on prices. The cutoff came after Ukraine made a
$1.5 billion overdue payment, but Russia demanded another $600 million,
including $450 million penalties for the late payment for gas shipped
in November and December. The two sides also have not agreed on prices
for 2009. Russia accused Ukraine of stealing gas destined for the rest
of Europe.
(AP, 1/2/09)(Reuters, 1/2/09)
2009 Jan 4, Gunmen hijacked a
vessel and 9 crewmen belonging to French oil services group Bourbon off
Nigeria's Niger Delta as it traveled toward a Royal Dutch Shell
offshore oilfield. The 9 crewmen: five Nigerians, two Ghanaians, one
Cameroonian and one Indonesian aboard. were released on Dec 7.
(Reuters, 1/4/09)(AP, 1/6/09)(AP, 1/7/09)
2009 Jan 5, Former US
Representative Joseph P. Kennedy said Citgo Petroleum, the US refiner
owned by the Venezuelan government, planned to stop deliveries to his
Boston-based nonprofit, Citizens’ Energy, due to falling oil prices.
(WSJ, 1/6/09, p.A7)
2009 Jan 6, In southern Nigeria
armed men robbed an offshore oil platform operated by a subsidiary of
US oil giant ExxonMobile although the attack did not disrupt oil
production.
(AFP, 1/7/09)
2009 Jan 7, Venezuela's Citgo
Petroleum Corp. announced its fuel oil aid program would continue, just
two days after its partner nonprofit group, Boston-based Citizens
Energy, said Citgo had halted the free fuel shipments due to the world
economic crisis.
(AP, 1/8/09)
2009 Jan 9, In India some 55,000
white collar workers at state-run oil companies called off a three-day
strike, after causing a severe fuel shortage in India.
(AP, 1/9/09)
2009 Jan 9, Somali pirates
released the MV Sirius Star, an oil-laden Saudi supertanker seized on
Nov 15, after receiving a $3 million ransom.
(AP, 1/9/09)
2009 Jan 11, Two Nigerian soldiers
were killed and one wounded in an attack by unidentified gunmen in the
restive oil-rich Niger Delta. Police said the attack might be connected
with the police seizure of a vessel, the Sandra Valleta, which was
carrying stolen crude oil.
(AFP, 1/12/09)
2009 Jan 18, Dubai said it has
reached a deal with Nigeria to invest in the African nation's
conflict-ravaged oil industry and other sectors of the economy.
(AP, 1/18/09)
2009 Jan 18, Russia and Ukraine
announced a deal to end the bitter dispute that has blocked Russian
natural gas from Europe following talks between Russian PM Vladimir
Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Yulia Tymoshenko. Under the terms,
Ukraine will pay 20 percent less than the European "market price" price
for gas this year, which Russia says is $450 per 1,000 cubic meters.
That's more than twice as much as the $179.50 Ukraine paid in 2008.
(AP, 1/18/09)
2009 Jan 19, Russia and Ukraine
signed a deal that restores natural gas shipments to Ukraine and paves
the way for an end to the nearly two-week cutoff of most Russian gas to
a freezing Europe.
(AP, 1/19/09)
2009 Jan 21, In Nigeria the
best-known militant group in the Niger Delta said one of its allies
carried out an attack on a tanker in southern Nigeria in which one
Romanian crewman was taken hostage. He was soon released. The MT
Meredith, loaded with 4,000 tons of diesel, was attacked by gunmen in
speedboats and sustained "massive damage" during the attack.
(AFP, 1/21/09)(AFP, 1/22/09)
2009 Jan 30, Exxon Mobil Corp.
reported a profit of $45.2 billion for 2008, breaking its own record
for a US company, even as its fourth-quarter earnings fell 33 percent
from a year ago.
(AP, 1/30/09)
2009 Feb 5, A nongovernment
organization said the corrupt elite of Cambodia, one of the world's
most impoverished nations, has laid the groundwork for siphoning off
vast profits from a coming boom in mining and oil exploitation.
(AP, 2/5/09)
2009 Feb 5, In Nigeria a private
security official said unidentified gunmen have attacked an
oil-industry vessel off the coast of Nigeria and killed its captain.
(AP, 2/5/09)
2009 Feb 10, A tanker burst into
flames after colliding with a container ship in a shipping channel off
the coast of Dubai. The Maltese-flagged tanker, Kashmir, was carrying
about 30,000 tons of oil condensate.
(AP, 2/10/09)
2009 Feb 13, Oil giant Royal Dutch
Shell said it has declared force majeure on shipments from its main
Nigerian terminal because of increased attacks by insurgents on key
facilities. Force Majeure (French for "superior force") is a common
clause in contracts which essentially frees both parties from liability
or obligation when an extraordinary event or circumstance beyond the
control of the parties.
(AP,
2/13/09)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Force_majeure)
2009 Feb 14, Irish authorities
learned about an oil spill through surveillance carried out by the
European Maritime Safety Agency in Lisbon, Portugal. Irish military
aircraft flew over the area and saw the Russian aircraft carrier
Admiral Kuznetsov, a Russian oil tanker, and a Russian oceangoing tug
near the slick. this was the biggest oil spill in the waters around
Ireland in the last ten years.
(AP, 2/17/09)
2009 Feb 17, In southern Nigeria
gunmen attacked two oil facilities operated by Royal Dutch Shell. A
local militant leader claimed responsibility for the attack in a letter
and threatened further violence. A Nigerian appeal court sacked the
governor of the southwestern state of Ekiti after complaints of vote
irregularities and ordered a fresh poll within three months.
(AP, 2/17/09)(AFP, 2/18/09)
2009 Feb 18, In Nigeria gunmen in
a midnight raid attacked a compound housing ExxonMobil staff in the
Niger Delta but were repulsed after a fierce battle with Nigerian
troops.
(AFP, 2/18/09)
2009 Feb 24, South Korea signed a
$3.55 billion deal with Iraq to help rebuild the war-ravaged country in
return for oil and gas. The deal was inked by South Korean President
Lee Myung-bak and his Iraqi counterpart Jalal Talabani.
(AP, 2/24/09)
2009 Feb 25, US Interior Sec. Ken
Salazar scrapped leases, created under the Bush administration, on
federal land for oil-shale development in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming.
(AP, 2/26/09)
2009 Mar 23, Suncor Energy Inc,
Canada's No.2 oil company, agreed to buy rival Petro-Canada for about
C$18.43 billion ($14.86 billion) to expand its oil sand reserves and
create the country's biggest energy group.
(Reuters, 3/23/09)
2009 Apr 8, In China visiting
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said the world's center of gravity has
moved to Beijing, as he focused on boosting Chinese oil purchases.
(AP, 4/8/09)
2009 Apr 8, Nigeria President
Umaru Yar'Adua dismissed top managers across the board of the state
Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC).
(AFP, 4/8/09)
2009 Apr 12, In Nigeria fire broke
out on the Trans-Niger Pipeline. All the feeder flowstations outside
Ogoniland (in Rivers State) adjoining it were shut down to allow for
repairs.
(AP, 4/13/09)
2009 Apr 13, In southern Nigeria
gunmen riding in 18 boats attacked a military houseboat outside an oil
facility, commandeering a naval vessel and killing one sailor.
(AP, 4/13/09)
2009 Apr 21, In Nigeria officials
said a strike by petrol truck drivers has caused a scarcity of fuel in
the commercial capital Lagos, leading to long queues at petrol
stations. The strike began at the weekend following a dispute between
the tanker drivers and officials of the Lagos state traffic management
authority LASMA. Gunmen in Nigeria attacked an oil tanker off the coast
of the Niger Delta, kidnapping the ship's captain and an engineer. The
Turkish vessel Ilena Mercan, chartered by French oil company Total, was
attacked on its way to Onne port in Nigeria's southeastern Rivers state.
(AFP, 4/21/09)(Reuters, 4/21/09)
2009 Apr 20, Nigerian pirates
attacked the Aleyna Mercan ship about 50 nautical miles off Onne port,
near the oil city of Port Harcourt. The vessel was delivering equipment
to French oil group Total. On April 22 the kidnappers released the
Turkish captain and the chief engineer.
(AFP, 4/23/09)
2009 Apr 23, Iran's official news
agency says Tehran has reached an agreement with Iraq to build a
pipeline that will feed Iraqi crude to an Iranian refinery.
(AP, 4/23/09)
2009 May 8, Venezuela’s National
Guard began occupying dozens of oil rigs, docks and boats operated by
private contractors, both local and foreign, hired by PDVSA, the state
oil company. It appeared that PDVSA had run out of cash.
(Econ, 5/16/09, p.44)
2009 May 13, Nigerian MEND rebels
hijacked an oil industry ship and held 15 foreign sailors hostage. They
demanded that all oil workers leave the southern Niger Delta by May 16.
(AP, 5/14/09)
2009 May 17, Jordan and Royal
Dutch Shell PLC signed a concessionary agreement to explore for oil in
the country's vast oil shale deposits.
(AP, 5/17/09)
2009 May 19, China and Brazil
signed a raft of agreements in Beijing including a $10 billion loan for
the South American country's state energy company and a deal to send
oil to China amid stronger ties between the two developing world giants.
(AP, 5/19/09)
2009 May 25, In Nigeria militants
sabotaged major crude pipelines in the chaotic oil region, further
trimming crude production as the military widened an operation to
uproot the fighters. Chevron in Nigeria reported a 100,000
barrel-per-day oil output cut after a militant attack the day before on
one of its pipelines in the southern Delta state. The militants said
they had released three Filipino hostages seized this month.
(AP, 5/25/09)(AFP, 5/25/09)
2009 Jun 5, Indians in Peru's
Amazon, protesting government moves to develop oil, gas and other
resources on their lands, battled police in an area called Curva del
Diablo, or "Devil's Curve." Authorities and Indian leaders reported the
death of 11 police and 25 protesters.
(AP, 6/5/09)
2009 Jun 8, Royal Dutch Shell
agreed In NYC to a $15.5 million settlement to end a lawsuit alleging
that the oil giant was complicit in the executions of activist Ken
Saro-Wiwa and other civilians by Nigeria's former military regime.
(AP, 6/8/09)
2009 Jun 9, In Nigeria MEND
(Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta) set a pumping
station of US oil giant Chevron on fire.
(AFP, 6/10/09)
2009 Jun 12, In Nigeria MEND
rebels breached Chevron’s Makaraba-Utonana-Abiteye pipeline and started
a fire at the Makaraba Jacket 5 facility in Delta State. MEND also
released a British oil sector worker who had been held for nine months.
(AFP, 6/13/09)
2009 Jun 13, Algeria's national
oil company Sonatrach announced it had awarded a 79.3-billion-dinar
(1.11-billion-dollar, 793-million-euro) contract to the Canadian
engineering firm SNC-Lavalin to build natural gas processing facilities.
(AFP, 6/13/09)
2009 Jun 15, Nigerian Petroleum
Development Company (NPDC) and China's state oil firm SIPEC said they
have discovered crude oil in Niger Delta region.
(AFP, 6/15/09)
2009 Jun 17, Royal Dutch Shell
said it had deferred shipments of crude oil from its Nigerian Forcados
exports terminal for two months due to delays in repairing a key
pipeline damaged by vandals.
(AFP, 6/17/09)
2009 Jun 18, Nigeria's main
militant group said it had destroyed a major crude oil pipeline
belonging to Royal Dutch Shell as it fights a campaign against foreign
oil companies.
(AFP, 6/18/09)
2009 Jun 19, Nigeria's main
militant group said it had destroyed a major pipeline supplying crude
oil to Italian oil group Agip's Brass exports terminal.
(AFP, 6/19/09)
2009 Jun 21, Nigeria's main
militant group said it had attacked a Shell offshore facility, the
third attack against the Anglo-Dutch company's facilities in Nigeria in
one day. The company denied the incident, saying the alleged incident
was part of the attack on two other Shell oil pipelines in southern
Rivers state earlier in the day.
(AFP, 6/21/09)
2009 Jun 25, Nigerian rebels said
that they carried out a pre-dawn attack against Royal Dutch Shell
facilities in a warning to Russia not to invest in the country's oil
and gas industry. Later in the day the main militant group blew up a
well-head in a Royal Dutch Shell (RDSa.L) oil field in Delta state,
hours after President Umaru Yar'Adua announced an amnesty offer for
gunmen.
(AFP, 6/25/09)(Reuters, 6/26/09)
2009 Jun 30, Iraq's long-awaited
licensing round to develop some of its massive oil reserves stumbled as
oil and gas companies dug in their heals, demanding more money for
their efforts than the government was willing to pay. Iraq celebrated
National Sovereignty Day, a new public holiday, following the
withdrawal of US forces from its cities. An explosion in Kirkuk killed
at least 30 people.
(AP, 6/30/09)(SFC, 7/1/09, p.A2)(AP, 7/2/09)
2009 Jul 1, The Indian government
announced a rise in petrol and diesel fuel prices, saying its hand had
been forced by the increase in global crude oil prices.
(AFP, 7/1/09)
2009 Jul 1, Iraq's government
approved a BP-led consortium's offer to develop a giant oil field in
the south, moving forward with the only deal struck during a much-hyped
but ultimately disappointing international oil auction. Ali Balo, the
head of the parliament's influential oil and gas committee said the
contracts "will face huge problems" if parliament is not allowed to
sign off on them.
(AP, 7/1/09)
2009 Jul 3, Algeria, Niger and
Nigeria signed an accord to build a 10-billion-dollar trans-Saharan gas
pipeline linking vast reserves in Nigeria to Europe.
(AFP, 7/3/09)
2009 Jul 4, Nigeria's rebel group
MEND threatened to thwart a 10-billion-dollar trans-Saharan gas
pipeline linking vast reserves in Nigeria to Europe. The army vowed to
protect the project. Rebels Sichem Peace oil tanker and its six
crew members. The ship and crew were freed July 21 after spending 18
days in captivity in the Niger Delta.
(AFP, 7/4/09)(AP, 7/22/09)
2009 Jul 5, Nigerian rebels
announced they had launched a fresh attack on an oil facility run by
the Anglo-Dutch group Shell in the restive Niger Delta. The militants
destroyed a Chevron oil pipeline junction in the latest attack on
Nigeria's key money earner since the government offered an amnesty.
(AP, 7/5/09)(AFP, 7/6/09)
2009 Jul 8, Nigerian MEND
militants said they blew up two key oil pipelines as they stepped up
attacks in response to a government amnesty offer.
(AFP, 7/8/09)
2009 Jul 10, Nigerian militants
claimed to have blown up for a second time a recently repaired oil
pipeline operated by US petroleum giant Chevron.
(AP, 7/11/09)
2009 Jul 12, Nigerian rebels took
their battle with the government into the country's main city,
targeting an oil tanker loading facility in Lagos harbor in an
unprecedented attack there.
(AFP, 7/13/09)
2009 Jul 22, An international
arbitration panel awarded the Sudanese government control over almost
all major oil reserves in a disputed region of Sudan that erupted into
violence last year between state forces and former southern rebels.
(AP, 7/22/09)
2009 Jul 29, Cuban state media
said Russia and Cuba have signed agreements to search for oil in the
Gulf of Mexico. Moscow extended the island $150 million in credit for
construction materials and farm machinery.
(AP, 7/29/09)
2009 Bryan Burrough authored “The
Big Rich: The Rise and Fall of the Greatest Texas Oil Fortunes.” It
entered on H.L Hunt, Sid Richardson, Clint Murchinson and Hugh Roy
Cullen, known as the Big Four of Texas oil.
(WSJ, 2/4/09, p.A11)
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