Mexico

Government and business leaders blasted the Obama administration’s continuing de facto moratorium on oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico (GOM) after Seahawk Drilling Inc., a major GOM shallow water driller, filed for bankruptcy Feb. 11.

Having failed last Friday to shut down the facility, the mayor of Ensenada in Baja California, Mexico, on Wednesday sought to negotiate tax revenues and a new gas transmission pipeline link with Sempra Energy’s Energia Costa Azul liquefied natural gas (LNG) receiving terminal along the Pacific Coast just north of the port city.

New Mexico House Speaker Ben Lujan has introduced legislation to boost the use of natural gas as a transportation fuel. HB 198 would give consumers an alternative to soaring gasoline prices and providing some incentives to convert their vehicles to run on compressed or liquefied natural gas. Currently, there are nine natural gas transportation fueling stations in the state, and most of the natural gas vehicles (NGV) are owned by municipalities. Under the proposed law vehicle owners would be credited with 70% of the conversion costs to switch to an NGV after receiving a 40% federal tax credit between now and Jan.1, 2017. A similar bill passed the state’s House last year but died in the Senate Finance Committee. Lujan said the typical NGV costs about $1.76/gallon, compared with more than $3/gallon for gasoline-fueled vehicles.

Government and business leaders blasted the Obama administration’s continuing de facto moratorium on oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico (GOM) after Seahawk Drilling Inc., a major GOM shallow water driller, filed for bankruptcy on Friday.

Federal regulators said over the weekend that natural gas flowing from a Gulf of Mexico platform jointly owned 50/50 by Apache Corp. and Stone Energy has stopped (see Daily GPI, Jan. 20).

The drilling moratorium may have been lifted in the Gulf of Mexico (GOM) to allow operators to get back to work, but in reality, that’s hardly the case, Chevron Corp. CEO John Watson said on Friday.

Nearly a third of U.S. deepwater production could be rendered uneconomic if Gulf of Mexico (GOM) permitting timelines are extended, according to a report released last week by the American Petroleum Institute (API).

After assessing public fear of an Arctic repetition of the Gulf of Mexico drilling disaster, the National Energy Board (NEB) is circulating a reminder that northern Canada has a different regulatory regime than the southern United States.

The drilling moratorium may have been lifted in the Gulf of Mexico (GOM) to allow operators to get back to work, but in reality, that’s hardly the case, Chevron Corp. CEO John Watson said on Friday.