India's Reliance ditches Oman offshore project

(Arabian Oil and Gas) -- Six years into their production sharing agreement with Oman's PDO, India's Reliance Industries has abandoned plans to develop an offshore oil exploration block in the Sohar basin in Oman, an oil and gas ministry official has told Reuters.

"Reliance has informed us that it was withdrawing from block 18 because the company said its discovery there does not justify the effort they put in the last six years," the ministry source told Reuters.

Reliance now plans to concentrate on its other concession in Oman, Block 41, in the eastern part of the sultanate, the official added.

Oman has signed many production sharing agreements in recent years in a bid to increase it's oil production output from

MRC

(Plastemart) -- As part of its global growth strategy, US based Eastman Chemical Company has opened a new subsidiary, Eastman Chemical India Pvt. Ltd. in Mumbai, as per Chemical Weekly.
Commenting on the move, Mr. Edwin Williamson, Vice President and MD, Asia Pacific, said "Over the past few years, China has been our primary growth market but we need, now, to enhance also our presence in India. We are already present in Mumbai with local employees and technical support, but this new legal status will better enable the company to pursue our growth objectives in India."

"Eastman Chemical India Pvt. Ltd. represents Eastman's renewed commitment to India and will serve as a platform for adding new talent and pursuing organic growth," noted Chandrasekharan Krishnan, Country Manager for India.

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(Plastemart) -- Alfa Laval - a world leader in heat transfer, centrifugal separation and fluid handling - has received an order for compact heat exchangers for phenol plant in China. The order value is about SEK 50 million and delivery is scheduled for 2012. The Alfa Laval heat exchangers will be used in the condensation phase in the production of phenol.

"This is the second order from the process industry in Asia in a short time. The order confirms that our compact heat exchangers have a leading position for energy efficient solutions in the refinery and petrochemical industry", says Lars Renstrom, President and CEO of the Alfa Laval Group.

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(BASF) -- BASF globally increases prices for calcium D-pantothenate (vitamin B5) products for use in human and animal nutrition by EUR 1.4 per kg (USD 2.0 per kg, respectively) effective immediately or as existing commitments allow. This increase is necessary to compensate for higher raw material cost, which have occurred in 2011.


Furthermore, BASF is to shut down the production of calcium D-pantothenate at its facility in Ludwigshafen for a few weeks during October 2011. The shut down is necessary to conduct a routine overhaul. All existing contractual obligations will be honored.


BASF is a leading supplier of calcium D-pantothenate worldwide. Calcium D-pantothenate is the salt of pantothenic acid and a vitamin used in human and animal nutrition.


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(ICIS) -- European chemical companies could be hit by excessively high charges for carbon permits if financial speculators are allowed to distort the EU's Emission Trading System (ETS), trade group Cefic said on Thursday.

There is a danger that speculators could distort the market for Emissions Trading Permits which must be purchased by industrial consumers of energy, including the chemical sector, from 2013, according to Cefic's director general Hubert Mandery. Mandery said he is still waiting for guarantees from European Commission officials that the market will be adequately supervised.

Under the next phase of ETS, the top 10% most efficient chemical plants will be exempt from the need to purchase permits. Operators of all other facilities will need to purchase permits if they want to continue operating.

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