Mexico

ExxonMobil Corp. has settled a lawsuit against the Department of Interior for the government’s decision to cancel Gulf of Mexico (GOM) offshore leases that could yield “billions of barrels of oil.”

BP plc has filed a federal lawsuit seeking reimbursement from Halliburton Co. for all of the cleanup costs following the Macondo well blowout in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico.

Canada’s National Energy Board (NEB) has approved Enbridge Bakken Pipeline Co. Inc.’s plans to build the 77-mile Bakken Pipeline Project Canada, which would connect to the Enbridge Pipelines Inc. (EPI) Mainline and carry crude oil from the Bakken Shale to North American refinery markets.

Well drilling permit approvals in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico (GOM) increased significantly from April to October but still fall below pre-moratorium levels and they may for some time, according to updated research by IHS Inc.

An equipment failure at a deepwater Gulf of Mexico drilling platform contracted by a unit of Royal Dutch Shell plc released about 319 barrels of biodegradable drilling mud and water last weekend before being contained, according to a report filed with the National Response Center (NRC).

The federal government has conditionally approved Shell Gulf of Mexico Inc.’s revised exploration plan proposing to drill up to six exploration wells in Alaska’s Chukchi Sea beginning in the 2012 drilling season.

An exploration well in the eastern deepwater Gulf of Mexico (GOM) is showing higher-than-expected natural gas pay, an Anadarko Petroleum Corp. executive said last week.

The 2011 Atlantic Hurricane season didn’t bring many tropical storms to Gulf of Mexico (GOM) energy interests or the North American mainland, but it did produce the third-highest number of tropical storms since records began in 1851 and continued a trend of active hurricane seasons begun in 1995, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

An exploration well in the eastern deepwater Gulf of Mexico (GOM) is showing higher-than-expected natural gas pay, an Anadarko Petroleum Corp. executive said Thursday.