Oil giants massive profits revive calls for windfall taxes

Global energy giants including Exxon Mobil Corp. and Chevron Corp. posted another round of huge quarterly profits, benefiting from surging natural gas and fuel prices that have boosted inflation around the world and led to fresh calls to further tax the sector, said Hellenicshippingnews.

Four of the five largest global oil companies have now reported results, combining for nearly USD50 billion in net income, lifted by tight global markets and disruption following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

The sheer size of the profits has revived calls from politicians and consumer groups to impose more taxes on the companies to raise funds to offset the hit to households, businesses and the wider economy from higher energy costs. They have also criticized big oil companies for not doing enough to raise production to offset rising fuel and heating costs.

Chevron Chief Financial Officer Pierre Breber warned in an interview with Reuters that “taxing production will just reduce it."

The company reported its second-highest profit of USD11.2 billion. However, the company’s global production is down so far this year from a year ago, and other U.S. oil companies signaled that output in the top-producing U.S. shale region is waning already.

“If you raise the costs on energy producers, it will decrease investment so that goes against the intent of increasing suppliers and making energy more affordable."

U.S. President Joe Biden, who earlier this year said Exxon was making “more money than God”, told oil companies this month that they were not doing enough to bring down energy costs.

Hours after Shell reported a quarterly profit of USD9.45 billion and raised its dividend by 15% on Thursday, Biden said the company was misusing its profits.

We remind, Cyclyx International, ExxonMobil and LyondellBasell announced they have signed an agreement to advance development of a first-of-its-kind plastic waste sorting and processing facility in the Houston area. The new facility addresses a critical missing link in the plastic waste supply chain by connecting community recycling programs to new and more advanced recycling technologies that have the potential to take a much wider variety of plastic materials.
mrchub.com

Due to the low market demand in Europe, Rohm extends the shut down of several methacrylate monomer production units in Worms into November, said Polymerupdate.

Rohm remains your reliable and committed Methacylates producer in Europe with two strong production sites in Worms and Wesseling serving our valuable customers.

We remind, Roehm intends to begin construction of its 250,000 tonnes per year methyl methacrylate (MMA) plant on the US Gulf Coast, with completion scheduled for 2023. Integrated into the OQ Chemicals manufacturing facility in Bay City, Texas, the plant will be the first to commercialize Roehm's low energy and wastewater LiMA MMA technology on an industrial scale. Separated from its former parent company Evonik and acquired by private equity firm Advent International in early 2019, Roehm has already hired Wood to provide engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) services for the project.

With 3,500 employees and 13 production sites worldwide, Rohm is one of the world’s leading manufacturers in the methacrylate business. The medium-sized company with branches in Germany, China, the USA, Mexico, and South Africa has more than 80 years of experience in methacrylate chemistry and a strong technology platform.

mrchub.com

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) and GAIL (India) Limited signed a Memorandum of Understanding to explore collaboration opportunities in liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply and decarbonisation, including short and long term LNG sales agreements, said Polymerupdate.

The agreement also includes potential optimization of LNG trading activities, the review of joint equity investments in renewables and the monitoring of greenhouse gasses for LNG cargoes, to support low carbon LNG supplies.

The agreement was exchanged between Sandeep Kumar Gupta, Chairman and Managing Director, GAIL (India) Ltd and Fatema Al Nuaimi, CEO ADNOC LNG in the presence of His Excellency Dr. Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology, UAE Special Envoy for Climate Change, and ADNOC Managing Director and Group CEO, and H.E. Shri Hardeep Singh Puri, India’s Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas and Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs at Abu Dhabi International Petroleum Exhibition and Conference (ADIPEC).

H.E. Dr. Al Jaber said: “India is a strategic partner of the UAE and we have a strong and longstanding bilateral relationship. Through this important new agreement, ADNOC and GAIL will seek opportunities to broaden our commercial partnership, with a particular focus on lower carbon energy supplies, in this case LNG, and joint opportunities for collaboration in new projects, decarbonization efforts and renewable energy."

H.E. Shri Hardeep Singh Puri said “India and the UAE enjoy strong bonds of friendship since historical times and this relationship is being further cemented through such partnerships. This MOU opens up opportunities for both GAIL and ADNOC in the energy sector which in turn helps to boost the trade and commerce relations between the two nations."

GAIL is one of India’s largest natural gas companies with integrated operations across the value chain, including exploration and production, processing, transmission, distribution, marketing, petrochemicals, LNG trading and shipping, city gas distribution and related services, both domestically and internationally, as well as expanding its presence in renewable energies including solar, wind and biofuels.

ADNOC is a responsible and reliable provider of energy products to customers globally. The company was the first LNG producer in the Middle East and has over 40 years’ experience in the LNG market. It is currently in the midst of a major expansion of its natural gas business, accelerating production to meet both domestic and international demand.

We remind, ADNOC Refining, a joint venture company between the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), Eni, and OMV, is set to complete the first phase of its innovative Waste Heat Recovery project at the General Utilities Plant in Ruwais, Abu Dhabi. ADNOC produces some of the world’s least-carbon intensive crude and the company is further reducing its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions intensity by 25% by 2030, aligned to the UAE Net Zero by 2050 Strategic Initiative.
mrchub.com

South Korea's exports logged an on-year decline in October for the first time in two years on sluggish global demand amid high inflation and an economic slowdown, said Koreaherald.

The country also suffered a trade deficit for the seventh consecutive month on high global energy prices, sparking concerns over its growth momentum.

Outbound shipments fell 5.7 percent on-year to come to USD52.48 billion last month, according to the data compiled by the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy. It was the first time since October 2020 that the country's exports marked an on-year decline.

The country's imports grew 9.9 percent on-year to USD59.18 billion in October on high global energy prices, resulting in a trade deficit of USD6.7 billion.

Imports have exceeded exports in South Korea since April, and it is the first time since 1995 that the country has suffered a trade deficit for seven months in a row.

South Korea depends on imports for most of its energy needs, and the country's energy imports surged 42.1 percent on-year to USD15.53 billion in October, the ministry said. (Yonhap).

We remind, KBR, Inc. (Houston) announced that it has won a contract from GS Caltex (Seoul, South Korea)for its planned plastics circularity project in South Korea. Based on KBR and Mura’s Hydro-PRT process, the 50,000-ton/yr unit will convert waste plastics into raw materials for conversion into new plastics, achieving total circularity.
mrchub.com

China produced a record volume of gasoil in September as refiners ramped up production ahead of winter and sought to capitalise on high export prices, said Hellenicshippingnews.

Output reached just over 17 million tonnes, up 26 per cent from August, noted China’s National Bureau of Statistics on Wednesday. Domestic demand is set to rise with winter approaching, but there are export dollars to be earned as well with refining margins rising to around USD40 a barrel in Asia, according to Refinitiv, a unit of the London Stock Exchange Group.

Output reached just over 17 million tonnes, up 26 per cent from August, noted China’s National Bureau of Statistics on Wednesday.

Domestic demand is set to rise with winter approaching, but there are export dollars to be earned as well with refining margins rising to around USD40 a barrel in Asia, according to Refinitiv, a unit of the London Stock Exchange Group. Ms Emma Li, a senior analyst at data intelligence firm Vortexa, said the higher production volumes could be linked to tighter supply in the domestic market.

Ms Li noted: “Recently, refiners have increased diesel yields at the expense of gasoline and jet fuel, and the state-run refiners need to increase refining run rates to fulfil the export target announced in September." Mr Steve Tan, vice-president of strategic content at Opis, a price reporting agency for energy and commodities, said the larger refiners in China will likely focus on domestic consumption and try to limit their exports to excess inventories.

He said: “We expect the smaller refiners will have a greater impetus to export. The key difference is that the larger refiners are able to roll over their export quotas to 2023 while the smaller refiners have to use theirs up by the end of 2022."

In September, Beijing granted refiners up to 15 million tonnes of oil product quotas for the rest of the year, partially reversing an export ban imposed in 2021. The decision to expand international sales was widely expected to offer relief to global markets, which have been grappling with the loss of Russian gasoil.

Gasoil is widely used for heating in the Northern Hemisphere, but supplies have been under severe pressure because of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

We remind, The world’s first commercial scale CO2-to-methanol plant has started production in Anyang, Henan Province, China. The cutting-edge facility is the first of its type in the world to produce methanol — a valuable fuel and chemical feedstock — at this scale from captured waste carbon dioxide and hydrogen gases.
The plant's production process is based on the Emissions-to-Liquids (ETL) technology developed by Carbon Recycling International (CRI) and first demonstrated in Iceland. The new facility can capture 160,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions a year, which is equivalent to taking more than 60,000 cars off the road.
mrchub.com