2008.03.28

Stabroek News: Finding seismic vessel harder with high oil prices.

"Sully had said in December that the shooting of 500 square kilometres of 3D seismic before drilling was a good idea since this would accurately pinpoint the opportunities for oil better than the 2D seismic - done around 1999 - could have. Sully had said that the company has the funds (US$15 million) to finance the seismic work.

"Oil companies Exxon and Repsol YPF are also in the process of getting their seismic work done in the hope of commencing drilling off Guyana's coast come 2009."

Oil Online: Fugro orders new-build geophysical survey vessel.

"Fugro has signed an agreement with ship designers and builders, Fr. Fassmer GMBH & Co. KG of Bremen, for the design and construction of a new geophysical survey vessel. It will be named the MV Fugro Searcher."

Associated Press: Dawson Geophysical Falls on "Hold" Call.

"‘Notwithstanding our solid outlook for seismic in the U.S., we believe that most of the upside for growth expectations is priced in and the price is nearing full valuation,’ Du wrote in a note to investors."

The Canadian Press: Pulse Data Inc. reports 2007 loss widens to about $5M or 10 cents per share.

"Not only did the Terrapoint deal collapse, but last year the company was caught up in a nasty takeover battle by Seitel Inc., a Delaware-based supplier of seismic data to the oil and gas industry."

PR Newswire: E&P Announces 2008 Hart Meritorious Award for Engineering Excellence Winners at Offshore Technology Conference.

"Exploration Technology: WesternGeco DSC Dynamic Spread Control technology was awarded for greatly improved repeatability of in-sea equipment positioning."

Business Wire: TGS Announces Availability of 'Reverse Time' Migration Algorithm.

"Reverse Time Migration is generally recognized as one of the biggest breakthroughs necessary to image the most complicated subsurface geological structures such as those encountered in the deepwater sub-salt basins of the Gulf of Mexico. RTM effectively solves the computationally intensive two-way wave equation problem and is able to accurately handle complex wave-propagation, including multi-bounding waves such as ‘prism waves’." ...

"‘The TGS RTM implementation combines the best attributes of one-way wave equation migration's ability to image events under salt and Kirchhoff migration that can image steeply dipping and even overturned events’ said Zhiming Li, Vice President of Imaging Services for TGS."

Penn Energy: GTX improves RTM turnaround time.

"In particular, this will reduce the time required to perform RTM on data acquired using complex azimuth geometry such as for sub-salt lines."

2008.03.11

Philippine Daily Inquirer: Ex-PNOC head new NBN witness.

"Eduardo Mañalac, who is said to have deep connections in China, is to testify at the Senate on Tuesday on how at least $41 million in alleged under-the-table commissions were funneled from the Chinese firm to the so-called ‘Greedy Group plus plus’ that was packaging the NBN-ZTE deal, said the sources who asked not to be named for security reasons.

"As PNOC president at the time, Mañalac was the signatory on behalf of the Philippine government in the now controversial Joint Marine Seismic Undertaking (JMSU) in the disputed Spratly Islands."

ABS-CBN News: Statement of former PNOC president Eduardo V. Mañalac.

"... my first reason for calling this press conference is to deny an account by the Philippine Daily Inquirer of my being the next ‘secret witness’ in the Senate's ZTE investigation." ...

"... my relationships with very highly placed officers in some of China's largest and most prestigious oil companies have always been above board and completely transparent. I created these relationships when I was Vice President for Exploration in the Beijing operations of one of the United States largest oil companies, Houston-based Conoco Phillips, a company for whom I worked 28 years. To imply that I ever used any of these relationships to broker some kind of greed-based government deal is a complete falsehood, and in my view represents the worst kind of journalism."

Philippine Information Agency: Commentary -- Seismic survey good for RP.

"If not for the seismic survey deal with China we would never knew of the vastness of oil deposits in our country's own portion of the Spratlys wherein some three trillion cubic feet of natural gas and oil deposits are located."

Reuters: Geokinetics Q4 net loss widens.

"Seismic data provider Geokinetics Inc posted a wider quarterly net loss, as margins shrunk due to higher idle time of its operating crews in Egypt and India, and suspension of operations at an Angola province." ...

"The company said fourth-quarter net loss widened by nearly 41 percent to $9 million.... Revenue fell nearly 7 percent to $85.5 million."

2008.03.10

Trade Arabia: Geosciences expo a 'big hit'.

"International and local companies praised the organisation of the show and the size of this year's event, which saw visitors queuing up before 9am to get into the Bahrain International Exhibition Centre which is hosting the exhibition."

Penn Energy: CGGVeritas begins Krishna-Godavari seismic survey.

"This is the 100th shallow water survey conducted by CGGVeritas worldwide and it will cover a total surface area of approximately 310 sq km (120 sq mi)."

Houston Business Journal: BHP Billiton leases more space in Galleria area.

"BHP Billiton Petroleum is significantly increasing the size of its Houston office space to accommodate growth, and has made plans to remain in the Galleria area for the next 13 years."

PR Newswire: Paradigm Appoints Jorge Machnizh as President and Chief Operating Officer.

"Machnizh will relocate to London, UK, continuing Paradigm's ongoing strategy to distribute executive leadership team members close to its global customer base and further reflect the international nature of the company. Machnizh joined Paradigm in 2005 as Chief Operating Officer. He succeeds John W. Gibson Jr., who remains in his role as Chief Executive Officer."

Houston Business Journal: Duncan still Houston's richest person.

"Oil industry veteran and real estate developer George Mitchell moved up from No. 3 to No. 2 in the Bayou City ... with a net worth of $3.2 billion."

WSJ (subscription): Oil Hits New High as OPEC Idles.

"Ministers from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, meeting in Vienna, blamed surging oil prices on the weak U.S. dollar and ‘mismanagement’ of the U.S. economy. President Bush shot back, telling a renewable-energy conference in Washington that ‘it should be obvious to all that the demand [for oil] is outstripping supply.’"

> Afterwards, the President called on the European Union to print more euros and fix the supply-demand imbalance of euros and dollars.

2008.03.06

Houston Chronicle: Finds in Gulf slump.

"According to the Wood Mackenzie report, companies found the equivalent of 553 million barrels of oil in the Gulf last year, half as much as in 2006 and the lowest figure in a decade."

Houston Chronicle: Anadarko will sell offshore stakes to Norway's StatoilHydro.

"The Woodlands-based oil and gas exploration company said it will sell its 50 percent stake in the Peregrino field offshore Brazil and its 25 percent interest in the BP-operated Kaskida prospects in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico for $1.8 billion plus another $300 million ‘conditional on future oil prices above pre-determined thresholds.’"