BP teams up with EDF to tackle methane leaks

MOSCOW (MRC) -- BP urged the US government to tighten rules limiting methane leaks from oil and gas operations as it teamed up with a prominent environmental group to develop technologies to limit emissions of the potent greenhouse gas, according to Hydrocarbonprocessing.

The London-based company joined rival Royal Dutch Shell in a call to President Donald Trump's administration to tighten methane regulation, rather than weaken Obama-era rules as it has planned.

"We believe in direct federal regulation of methane for new and existing sources here in the United States," Bernard Looney, head of BP oil and gas production, told Reuters at the CERAWeek conference by IHS Markit in Houston on Tuesday.

Methane leaks from oil and gas production, storage and transportation are a major source of greenhouse gas emissions that are blamed for climate change. The energy industry is the largest source of US methane emissions, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency.

BP aimed to reduce methane emissions to 0.2 percent of its overall oil and gas production by 2025, and was able to achieve that target in 2018, Looney said.

The company is about to deploy a drone carrying infrared cameras to monitor around 1,500 wells in its US onshore shale operations to detect early signs of leaks, he said.

BP announced on Wednesday a three-year partnership with the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), a New York-based nonprofit environmental advocacy group, aimed at developing further technologies to detect and prevent methane leaks.

Leaks are rising as natural gas production increases to meet growing demand for electricity. Methane is the primary component of natural gas, and has more than 80 times the heat-trapping potential of carbon dioxide in the first 20 years after it escapes into the atmosphere, scientists say.

With investors ramping up pressure on companies to reduce carbon emissions and focus on clean energy, limiting methane has become central.

"For us at BP, gas is absolutely central for the world's need for more energy and at the same time less emissions," Looney said.

EDF President Fred Krupp said that methane is responsible for more than a quarter of the global warming experienced today.

If all energy companies achieved methane emission targets similar to BP, it would be equal to shutting roughly 2,000 big coal-fired power plants, Krupp said.

"The reputation of natural gas is going to be determined not only by BP's performance but by the performance of the fuel overall," Krupp said.

As MRC reported earlier, in February 2018, BP announced that it would increase investment in the United States after the lowering of tax rates under President Donald Trump, Chief Executive Bob Dudley. BP invested USD90 billion in the United States over the past decade, excluding USD65 billion in fines and clean up costs over the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster, making it the country's biggest investor in the energy sector, Dudley said then.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Aruba will resume a refurbishment project at a 209,000 barrel-per-day refinery operated by a unit of Citgo Petroleum Corp, after a change to U.S. sanctions on Citgo parent PDVSA, as per Hydrocarbonprocessing with reference to the island’s prime minister.

The United States levied sanctions in January on Venezuela’s state-owned oil company Petroleos de Venezuela aimed at the removal of socialist President Nicolas Maduro, whom the United States and about 50 other countries no longer recognize as the country’s legitimate leader.

The sanctions prompted Citgo Aruba to put on hold a USD685 million agreement with the government of Aruba, reached in 2016, to refurbish and reopen the idled refinery previously run by U.S. refiner Valero Energy. The company laid off workers as a result, and Prime Minister Evelyn Wever-Croes asked the United States to allow the project to continue.

Last week, the US Treasury gave Citgo - a US refining company owned by PDVSA - a further 18 months to buy crude and make debt payments while under sanctions against his parent. Wever-Croes said the move would allow the refurbishment projects to continue, and the workers to return to their jobs.

"American authorities allowed the unblocking of the necessary funds to continue," Wever-Croes said in a statement. "We will keep fighting so that all the refinery workers can get their jobs back."

The statement did not say when the project would continue.

As MRC informed before, in late January 2019, Citgo Petroleum Corp idled the small gasoline-producing unit at its 157,500-barrel-per-day (bpd) Corpus Christi, Texas, refinery for economic reasons. The 13,000-bpd FCCU 1 was shut for "non-operational reasons" the company said in a notice filed with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. The sources said FCCU 1 was not profitable for the refinery to operate.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Exxon Mobil Corp has reduced gasoline production at its 560,500 barrel per day (bpd) Baytown, Texas, refinery after a hydrotreater fire on Saturday, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

There were no injuries reported in the blaze at the Hydrofining Unit 9 on Saturday, the sources said. In an emailed statement, Exxon said it had now contained the fire, which started at about 12:30 p.m. local time (1730 GMT). It confirmed no injuries had been reported.

"We are cooperating with necessary regulatory agencies, and a thorough investigation will be conducted to determine the cause of this incident," Exxon said.

The unit uses hydrogen and a catalyst to remove sulfur from gasoline in compliance with U.S. environmental rules.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Thyssenkrupp AG said Monday that it has received a large order from Egypt's El Nasr Company for Intermediate Chemicals to design and build a fertilizer complex, said the company.

The German engineering group said the order value is several hundred million euros.

Thyssenkrupp said the new complex will be built around 100 kilometers (62 miles) southeast of Cairo and should begin operations in 2022.

The complex is expected to be operational in 2022 and will have an annual production of up to 440,000 tonnes of ammonia, 380,000 tonnes of urea and 300,000 tonnes of calcium ammonium nitrate (CAN).

The new plants are part of NCIC’s plans to expand its current product portfolio to include high-quality nitrogen fertilizer for local and export markets, said the release.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- A storage tank fire on the Houston Ship Channel sent a plume of black smoke across the eastern half of the city on Sunday forcing residents in the suburb of Deer Park, Texas, to remain indoors, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

A giant storage tank containing volatile naphtha at Intercontinental Terminals Co (ITC) Deer Park site continued to burn six hours after the blaze broke out at about 10:30 a.m. local time (1530 GMT).

Ships were continuing to move along the ship channel which connects refineries and chemical plants in Houston and Texas City, Texas, with the Gulf of Mexico. The only restriction on shipping was an order from the U.S. Coast Guard not to dock at ITC or an adjoining terminal.

The fire was not affecting operations at the nearby Royal Dutch Shell Plc joint-venture refinery in Deer Park, according to Shell spokesman Ray Fisher.

ITC Vice President Alice Richardson said the company was attempting to gain control over the fire by using fire-suppressing foam. “We’re fighting this fire defensively to keep it contained to this tank,” Richardson told a news conference.

The burning tank is surrounded by several other storage tanks within a spill containment dike.

Naphtha derived from refining crude oil is most often used to create reformates which boost octane in gasoline.
MRC