EIA forecasts $89 WTI by end of 2011 12/12/2010
Winter crude oil price expected to average $6 higher than last year; growth in US real gross domestic product of 2.7% this year
The U.S. Department of Energy's Energy Information Administration is forecasting the price of West Texas Intermediate crude oil to average $84 per barrel over this winter (October through March) and r...

Pew group slams Arctic offshore response plans 11/21/2010
Report says severe weather and sea conditions, and lack of support infrastructure, would compromise attempts to recover spilled oil
The Pew Environment Group has published a report strongly questioning the practicality of conducting an oil spill response in the Arctic offshore. "Darkness, extreme weather and shifting sea ice could...

The Explorers 2010: ENI Petroleum 11/14/2010
Italian major Eni Petroleum took its first stab at Alaska in the late 1960s as Agip Petroleum, but didn't begin exploring in earnest until it bought a portfolio of North Slope leases from Armstrong Al...

Eni pushes first oil at Nikaitchuq 11/07/2010
Italian major tells RCA oil production could start early with at least 3,500 barrels per day, but several permits outstanding
Eni Petroleum appears to be ahead of schedule at the Nikaitchuq unit. The Italian major recently told state regulators that it believes oil production at the nearshore field off Alaska's North Slope c...

Eni modules reach site 08/08/2010
Sealift for Nikaitchuq production facilities has arrived off Oliktok Point
Two large modules for Eni Petroleum's Nikaitchuq oilfield production facilities have arrived off the central North Slope, the company told Petroleum News Aug. 2. "Both of the modules, the processing f...

Regulatory board says censorship a 'mistake' 08/01/2010
Newfoundland regulator concedes it blundered in limiting information made public on emergency response plan for deepwater well
The public may never have felt more certain about its right to know the details of blowout response plans by offshore explorers. Amid the fallout from the Gulf of Mexico catastrophe, it would seem, at...

Bush DOI chiefs: Major spill not expected 07/25/2010
Two former Interior secretaries told Congress July 20 they did not anticipate an accident as large as the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. But Gale Norton and Dirk Kempthorne say no one else did ei...

Wrangle over OCS drilling continues 07/18/2010
Salazar announces re-jigged moratorium after 5th Circuit court upholds injunction against earlier 6-month deepwater drilling ban
On July 12, in a move presumably designed to trump court decisions against the Department of the Interior's attempted six-month moratorium on deepwater drilling on the U.S. outer continental shelf, In...

EIA: Oil production loss from moratorium 06/13/2010
Agency projects Interior's 6-month hold on deepwater drilling will cost 26,000 barrels in 4th quarter, up to 70,000 bpd next year
The six-month moratorium on deepwater drilling imposed by the U.S. Department of the Interior in late May will result in a 26,000 barrel-per-day loss of U.S. production in the fourth quarter of this y...