INTERNATIONAL BRIEFS

TANKERS

ABOUT 36-73 BBL OF CRUDE spilled into Northwest England's River Mersey from Kuwait Oil Tanker Co.'s 263,679 dwt Tonbridge tanker while it was offloading cargo at Shell U.K. Ltd.'s Tranmere terminal. Only a small volume came ashore. Shell said at least one valve on the Tonbridge was not set properly, allowing oil to escape into the river through the ship's sea valve. Shell was fined 1 million after 2,555 bbl of Venezuelan heavy crude spilled into the river from a pipeline leak at Tranmere last August.

PETROCHEMICALS

IDEMITSU PETROCHEMICAL CO. LTD. licensed the ProCam software system from ChemShare, Houston, to model operations at ethylene plants in Chiba and Tokuyama, Japan. ChemShare will install the system at Chiba and Idemitsu at Tokuyama, both by first quarter 1991.

EXPLORATION

AFRO-WEST AMERICA INC., New York, signed an oil exploration concession agreement for 16 blocks covering about 8,000 sq miles off Sierra Leone.

KERR-MCGEE (U.K.) PLC plans further drilling on the block where its 13/22b-4 discovery well flowed 22.3 MMcfd of gas and 5,224 b/d of condensate in the U.K. North Sea. Site is immediately south of Texaco North Sea's Captain heavy oil field in Block 13/22a. Interests are Kerr-McGee 39%, Phillips Petroleum Co. (U.K.) Ltd. 30%, Norsk Hydro Oil & Gas Ltd. 20%, Monument Exploration & Production Ltd. 10%, and Fishermen's Petroleum Co. plc 1%.

TWO COMPANIES took farmouts on South China Sea blocks off Viet Nam operated by International Petroleum Ltd. (see map, OGJ, Mar. 19, p. 24). Overseas Petroleum Investment Corp. acquired a 20% interest in Block 115, Cairn Energy plc a 10% interest in Block 22. IPL completed 2,510 line km of seismic survey on Block 22 and expects to complete 3,500 line km on Block 115 by next month.

OIL INDIA LTD. 1 Dandewala flowed 1.94 MMcfd of 62% methane gas through a 12/64 in. choke with 2,400 psi flowing tubing pressure from one Pariwar zone at 6,628-38 ft in the Jaisalmar district of Rajasthan, India. There are shows of oil in upper zones, and six more sands are to be tested in the well, at 14,764 ft the deepest in Rajasthan.

PETROLEOS DEL ECUADOR 1 Chananque flowed 945 b/d of 32 gravity oil from Cretaceous Napo T and U sands in the northern Oriente region. Petroecuador plans two more wildcats this year-1 Sinque in the Cuyabeno area and 1 Punino north of Coca field.

ARGOSY ENERGY INTERNATIONAL'S 1 Linda discovery is in the Putumayo region of Colombia. The location was omitted in an earlier report (OGJ, July 16, p. 48).

ACQUISITIONS

SOUTH KOREA'S National Agricultural Cooperative Federation acquired Agrico Korea Enterprises SA's 25% interest in Korean fertilizer/chemicals concern Namhae Chemical Corp. for $80 million. Proceeds will go to fund Agrico parent Freeport McMoRan Resource Partners LPL's development of its sulfur and oil discovery on Main Pass Block 299 off Louisiana.

PIPELINES

PACIFIC COAST ENERGY CORP., Vancouver, B.C., let a $10 million contract to Banister Pipe Lines Ltd., Edmonton, to lay 21 miles of 12 in. and 24 in. pipeline for the Greater Vancouver Water District section of the Vancouver Island gas line project. Construction is to be complete in the fall. Banister also is laying a line on Vancouver Island for the project.

WESTCOAST ENERGY INC., Vancouver, B.C., applied to Canada's National Energy Board for an average 5% toll increase for firm transportation service and to cut winter and summer tolls for interruptible service. Trans-Northern Pipelines Inc., Toronto, applied for an average toll hike of 10.6% for transporting petroleum products effective July 1, 1990.

COMPANIES

PETROLEOS DEL ECUADOR'S outlays in 1990 will total $160 million, of which about $49 million is earmarked for exploration and the balance production, refining, and transportation.

INDIA'S Oil & Natural Gas Commission secured a 5-8 1/2 year, 20 million line of credit from Barclay's Bank plc, London, at 8.3% to cover purchase of U.K. equipment. Minimum contract value is 150,000 with a 24 month order period.

REFINING

ELF AQUITAINE GROUP acquired a 20.5% interest, to rise to 25% within 1 year, in Spanish refiner/marketer Cepsa through an infusion of capital. At the same time, Elf acquired a 3.2% in Banco Central, a Spanish bank with a significant holding in Cepsa.

KUWAIT PETROLEUM EUROPOORT BV commissioned a 6,200 b/sd UOP Penex/Molex unit at its Europoort, Netherlands refinery. The unit hikes the clear research octane number of light straight run naphtha by more than 20 numbers at yields approaching 100% volume of fresh feed. UOP handled detailed design, procurement of major equipment, and module construction.

DRILLING-PRODUCTION

JAPEX OMAN placed Daleel field in the Wadi Aswad area of northern Oman on stream at 8,500 b/d, with flow to rise to 10,000 b/d by yearend. Japex Oman is a venture of Japan National Oil Corp., Japan Exploration Co. Ltd., C. Itoh Energy Development, and Indonesia Petroleum Co.

MARATHON OIL U.K. LTD. let contract to British Offshore Engineering Technology Ltd. for front end engineering design of a subsea separation unit (SSU) for possible use in West Brae field in the U.K. North Sea. It entails a single stage subsea separator near wellheads with liquids pumped to Brae A platform 6.2 miles away. Separated gas will flow to Brae A in a separate pipeline under the SSU's operating pressure. British Offshore earlier conducted extended trials of an SSU in Argyll field.

TRANSWORLD OIL LTD., Hamilton, Bermuda, acquired a 50% interest in the Bukha gas/condensate field concession off Oman through buyout of Wintershall Oman BV, a unit of BASF.

ALTERNATE FUELS

ENIRICERCHE, Milan, let contract to Energy & Environmental Research Center, Grand Forks, N.D., for a project to convert waste ebonite into a clean burning gas to fuel power plants in Italy. Bench scale tests are to begin late this month. Eniricerche disposes about 10,000 tons/year of the hard plastic into landfills.

GAS PROCESSING

CANADA'S National Energy Board plans an Aug. 20 hearing in Ottawa on an application by Westcoast Energy Inc. to expand capacity of its McMahon gas processing plant in Northeast British Columbia by 18% to 680 MMcfd. The expansion is to be completed by November 1991 for $108 million.