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MOSCOW (MRC) -- Italian oil and gas
group Eni said on Wednesday it would reduce its capital expenditure this
year by around EUR2 billion (USD2.17 billion) to mitigate the impact from
falling commodity prices following the coronavirus emergency, reported
Reuters.
Planned capex will be cut by around EUR2.5-3.0 billion next
year, it added.
"We are taking these actions in order to defend our
robust balance sheet and the dividend while maintaining the highest standards of
safety at work," Eni CEO Claudio Descalzi said in a statement.
Eni
expects 2020 output of between 1.8 and 1.84 million barrels of oil equivalent
per day and the same for next year.
As MRC informed earlier,
Italian energy group Eni said last week all its refineries in Italy were working
normally except for two which had partially cut their volumes for maintenance
work.
Besides, operations at Italian petrochemical producer Versalis
(part of Eni) have not affected by
emergency quarantine measures in the country. Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe
Conte extended its emergency coronavirus measures Wednesday evening and
announced the closure of "non-essential" commercial businesses. This follows the
announcement of a nationwide lockdown on Monday, limiting movement for around 60
million people. Under these measures people will only be allowed to leave their
homes for work or health reasons. Versalis has three steam crackers in Italy,
capable of producing 1.675 million mt of ethylene, 750,000 of propylene and
285,000 mt of butadiene a year.
Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for
producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).
According to MRC's ScanPlast report,
Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 215,390 tonnes in the first month of
2020, up by 23% year on year. Shipments of all grades of high density
polyethylene (HDPE) and linear low density polyethylene (LLDPE) increased due to
higher capacity utilisation at ZapSibNeftekhim. At the same time, PP shipments
to the Russian market were 127,240 tonnes in January 2020, up by 33% year on
year. ZapSibNeftekhim's homopolymer PP accounted for the main increase in
shipments. |
