News

Gas tanker operation at gas terminal (copyright by Adobe Stock/Kalyakan)
Gas tanker operation at gas terminal (copyright by Adobe Stock/Kalyakan)

New Transit Pipeline To Be Built in Turkey

Botas, Turkey's state-owned crude oil and natural gas pipelines and trading company, has opened a tender for the construction of a jetty, measuring station and transit pipeline for a new Floating Storage Regasification Unit (FSRU) LNG import terminal on the Gulf of Saros in northwest Turkey.

Landscape in South Caucasus (copyright by Adobe Stock/dmitriygut)
Landscape in South Caucasus (copyright by Adobe Stock/dmitriygut)

Unresolved Nagorno-Karabakh Matter Threatens to Disrupt Caucasus Pipelines

The long simmering Azerbaijan-Armenian conflict, centering around the region of Nagorno-Karabakh and subject to frequent eruptions over the course of its post Soviet history, has blown once again.  At least four Azeri soldiers were killed and scores wounded, in addition to a number of wounded Armenian soldiers.

Supreme Court Washington DC USA (copyright by Adobe Stock/steheap)
Supreme Court Washington DC USA (copyright by Adobe Stock/steheap)

The End of Keystone XL? Pipeline Projects in the US Take Another Hit

In the wake of judicial decisions effectively shutting down the Atlantic and Dakota Access interstate pipeline projects, the Supreme Court of the United States has ruled that construction on the infamous Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline cannot begin, thus rejecting a bid by President Donald Trump’s administration to jump-start the long-delayed project.

court gavel on court desk (coypright by Adobe Stock/BillionPhotos.com)
court gavel on court desk (coypright by Adobe Stock/BillionPhotos.com)

Energy Transfer Ordered To Shut Down Dakota Access Oil Pipeline

Energy Transfer's $3.8bn, 1,172-mile underground pipeline carrying oil from North Dakota across South Dakota and Iowa and to a shipping point in Illinois and up and running for three years already has been ordered to cease operations by a district court judge until a more thorough environmental assessment review has been made.

View of the sea and the end of a pipeline from inside of a pipeline (copyright by Adobe Stock/Luka)
View of the sea and the end of a pipeline from inside of a pipeline (copyright by Adobe Stock/Luka)

US Energy Companies Abandon Atlantic Coast Pipeline

In an announcement shocking in its implications for interstate pipeline development, Dominion Energy and Duke Energy have canceled their Atlantic Coast Pipeline project, a natural gas pipeline that was to stretch hundreds of miles across West Virginia, Virginia and North Carolina, citing "legal uncertainty."

Laying the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline (copyright by Adobe Stock/fotograupner)
Laying the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline (copyright by Adobe Stock/fotograupner)

Nord Stream: The EU Stiffens its Spine In Standing Up To Washington

In the face of expanded US sanctions against companies and countries participating in the development of Nord Stream 2, the EU is preparing its own measures to protect the European Union as the United States tightens its sanctions law.

 African pipelines in the sunrise (copyright by Shutterstock/Kodda)
African pipelines in the sunrise (copyright by Shutterstock/Kodda)

Nigeria Commences Biggest Pipeline Project in Its History

Nigeria has begun constructing a $2.8 billion gas pipeline project, the biggest in the country's history. The 614-km long pipeline will run from Ajaokuta to Kano under the auspices of Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).

MOL Group headquarters (copyright by Shutterstock)
MOL Group headquarters (copyright by Shutterstock)

Hungary's MOL Joins Turkstream

While Nordstream stutters on its way to Europe, Turkstream is proceeding apace:  Hungary's MOL announced last week that it would join the Turkstream pipeline consortium. The regulator approved a 10-year development plan that includes the construction of a new Serbian-Hungarian gas inter-connector, with a capacity of 6 billion cubic meters annually.

 Oil pipe line valve in front of the Iranian flag on the oil barrels (copyright by Adobe Stock/Maksym Yemelyanov)
Oil pipe line valve in front of the Iranian flag on the oil barrels (copyright by Adobe Stock/Maksym Yemelyanov)

Iran building pipeline to avoid disputed oil waterway

The Goureh-Jask route will bring 1 million b/d of oil from the southern Bushehr province to the Iranian coast on the Sea of Oman for exports. The project, which would cost over $1.1 billion, envisages storage capacity of 10 million barrels of crude.

court ruling (copyright by Adobe Stock/BillionPhotos.com)
court ruling (copyright by Adobe Stock/BillionPhotos.com)

Circuit Court Orders Enbridge to Stop Operations of Line 5 Pipeline Segments

A portion of Enbridge's Line 5 oil and gas liquids pipeline, a 6.4-km segment dividing into two pipes lying on the bottom of the Straits of Mackinac, connecting Lake Huron and Lake Michigan between Michigan's Upper and Lower peninsulas, has been temporarily shut down pending a hearing on its safety scheduled for next Tuesday.

 pipeline bridge  (copyright by Adobe Stock/Cardaf)
pipeline bridge (copyright by Adobe Stock/Cardaf)

Harvest Midstream Company Announces the Completion of the New Ingleside Pipeline

Harvest Midstream Company, a privately held midstream services provider based in Houston and operating crude oil and natural gas gathering, storage, transportation, treatment, and terminalling assets across the Lower 48 and Alaska, has announced the completion of the Ingleside Pipeline.

 Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates (copyright by Adobe Stock/Sergii Figurnyi)
Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates (copyright by Adobe Stock/Sergii Figurnyi)

A Record $20.7 Billion Offered for Adnoc's Midstream Pipeline Assets

"You can't have your cake and eat it too," goes the old English adage.  Yet with a record consortium offer of $20.7 billion for the lucrative midstream pipeline assets of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc), the Emiratis can be pardoned for believing you can.

A Red Pin on Guyana of the World Map (copyright by Shutterstock/hyotographics)
A Red Pin on Guyana of the World Map (copyright by Shutterstock/hyotographics)

Despite Minor Setback Exxon Mobil Still Intends to Build Subsea Pipeline

Exxon Mobil has succeeded in restoring crude oil production in its upstream project off of Guyana's coast after problems with its gas reinjection equipment, according to Vincent Adams, Head of Guyana's Environmental Protection Agency.

City Business District, Johannesburg (copyright by Shutterstock/Nataly Reinch)
City Business District, Johannesburg (copyright by Shutterstock/Nataly Reinch)

Transnet is Growing Tired of all of the Product Thievery at Its Pipelines

Transnet, a South African diversified rail, port and pipeline company known as the guardian of the country's pipeline assets, said today that since April of this year 26 fuel theft incidents removing over two million liters of petroleum products had been stolen from Transnet's 3000-km pipelines.

Gazprom logo on sky background (copyright by Adobe Stock/Alexey Novikov)
Gazprom logo on sky background (copyright by Adobe Stock/Alexey Novikov)

Gazprom Wants More Money For Its Gas Shipped to Poland

From repeated setbacks affecting the further development of Nordstream 2 to slackened Chinese demand affecting the completion of the Power of Siberia, to the $1.5 billion arbitration loss against the Polish PGNiG, Gazprom can be excused for possibly thinking the world has turned against it.

View of pipeline in northern Alaska (copyright by Adobe Stock/reisegraf)
View of pipeline in northern Alaska (copyright by Adobe Stock/reisegraf)

Low Pipeline Utilization in Midstream USA

The advent of Covid19, lockdown in lower 48, slack demand, oil price crash and a corresponding slash in capital expenditure have all taken a huge toll on the upstream sector of the US petroleum industry.  Many of the companies specializing in shale oil production will not survive in this low price environment.

Laying the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline (copyright by Adobe Stock/fotograupner)
Laying the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline (copyright by Adobe Stock/fotograupner)

Is Nord Stream 2 A Pipeline to Nowhere?

The recent bill put forward in the US Senate by Senators Ted Cruz and Jeanne Shaheen may have been the proverbial straw that has broken the camel's back.  For in its wake Germany has stiffened its spine and publicly voicing its displeasure with the current US-German relationship under President Donald Trump.

The Trans-Andean oil pipeline passing through montane rainforest in the Ecuadorian Amazon (copyright by Adobe Stock/Atelopus)
The Trans-Andean oil pipeline passing through montane rainforest in the Ecuadorian Amazon (copyright by Adobe Stock/Atelopus)

Another Bad Day For Ecuador's Accident-prone Crude Oil Pipeline System

Ecuador’s northern Amazon rainforest has seen heavy oil contamination since rich oil fields were discovered there in the 1960s. Billions of gallons of oil waste was dumped by then American oil giant Texaco into unlined, open-air pits in the ground.

American flag waving with the Capitol Hill (copyright by Adobe Stock/rarrarorro)
American flag waving with the Capitol Hill (copyright by Adobe Stock/rarrarorro)

New Proposed Senate Sanctions Could be the Death Knell for Nordstream 2

As if there were not enough existing obstacles thrown in Nordstream 2's way (see Pipeline Technology Journal, 27 May 2020), Senators Ted Cruz and Jeanne Shaheen announced a bill today on Capitol Hill to expand sanctions on the troubled gas pipeline to prevent its completion and thus end what they see as Moscow's plan to raise its economic and political influence in