Daily Energy News
Policy & Regulatory
Crown Estate Scotland has selected 13 projects in its INTOG (Innovation and Targeted Oil & Gas) leasing round, aimed to develop innovative offshore wind projects of 100 MW (IN) or less and larger offshore wind projects to directly supply offshore oil and gas platforms (TOG) in Scottish waters (United Kingdom). A total of 19 applications were submitted and applied for seabed rights, and 13 projects were selected and offered initial exclusivity agreements.
Chad nationalises ExxonMobil's oil assets
Chad has announced the nationalisation of all the assets and rights held by ExxonMobil's affiliate Esso in the country.
The European Parliament and the European Council have reached a political agreement on decarbonising the EU maritime transport. It requires to gradually cut CO2 emissions of large ship below the 2020 level (91.16 gCO2/MJ of energy used), by 2% as of 2025, 6% as of 2030, 14,5% as of 2035, 31% as of 2040, 62% as of 2045 and 80% as of 2050.
The National Energy Administration (NEA) of China plans to launch a pilot scheme to accelerate the development of renewables in rural areas. Provincial-level government departments would identify rural pilot counties for the development of renewable projects and submit development plans to the NEA by the end of May 2023. This scheme would enable to raise the share of renewable energies to 30% of primary energy consumption and over 60% of new capacity primary energy consumption in the pilot counties by 2025.
Companies
The Israeli gas producer Energean is considering raising the capacity of its 8 bcm/year floating production storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel off Israel to 12 bcm/year. The FPSO is expected to process resources from the Karish offshore gas field, which started to produce gas in October 2022 and should reach a production level of 6.5 bcm by the end of 2023.
Energy & Climate Markets
Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) has discovered a new deeper reservoir in the first exploration well in Abu Dhabi's Offshore Block 2 Exploration Concession. Between 1,000 and 1,500 bcf (28.3 to 42.5 bcm) of raw gas would be in place. This discovery follows an initial finding in February 2022, raising the total amount of gas in place from this single well to 2.5 - 3.5 tcf (71 - 99 bcm).
Energy Prices & Taxes
China has decided to extend zero tariffs on coal imports, which were introduced in April 2022, until the end of 2023. In April 2022, in a context of concerns of supply disruptions and domestic energy security, the Chinese Ministry of Finance announced cuts in import tariffs for all types of coal to zero from 1 May 2022 until 31 March 2023. Before April 2022, import tariffs stood between 3% and 6%, but stood at 0 for Indonesian coal.
Infrastructure & Investments
The German Ministry of Economy and Climate of Germany and the Ministry of Climate, Energy and Utilities of Denmark have agreed to develop a land-based hydrogen pipeline that would enable hydrogen exports from Denmark to Germany as of 2028. The hydrogen pipeline project, whose capacity has not been specified, would strengthen the PtX agreement signed in March 2022 in Denmark and would help the German industry decarbonate its operations.
The Swedish renewable project developer OX2 has decided to develop a 1.9 GW offshore energy hub off Blekinge, in the southern Baltic Sea (Sweden). The Neptunus project would include offshore wind turbines with a combined capacity of 1,900 MW and would produce around 8 TWh/year of electricity, part of which would be converted to hydrogen thanks to an offshore electrolyser (up to 225 kt/year). OX2 plans to submit an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) by 2024 and the energy hub could be operational in the early 2030s.
The Elbehafen LNG terminal, located in Brunsbüttel (Schleswig-Holstein) in northern Germany, has started injecting gas into the German gas transmission system.