Brazilian state-owned petroleum company Petrobras exported 1 million barrels of oil per day in April, representing a new oil export record, despite low oil demand caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Reuters reports that Brazil’s state-controlled oil company Petroleo Brasileiro SA has ordered its ships to avoid the Strait of Hormuz. According to a statement, the decision was taken after consultations with Brazil’s Navy, not affect Petrobras’ fuel supply in Brazil.
Maersk is accused of paying $3.4m on bribes to get shipping contracts from the Brazilian energy giant, Petrobras, which has been caught up in a multi-billion dollar bribery case for years. Namely, Maersk has confirmed that its offices in Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo have been searched by the Brazilian Federal Police, adding that it will fully cooperate with the authorities, in relation to the allegations regarding the payment of bribes to national oil company Petrobras over a 10-year period through to 2012.
Petrobras informed on Monday, September 9 that it will start leasing its LNG regasification terminal, as well as an associated gas pipeline in the northeastern state of Bahia. The move is in line with an agreement made with Brazil’s antitrust regulator Cade in July to open up the Brazilian natural gas market to additional competition.
In the second round of bidding for four of its refineries, Petrobras has allegedly selected four groups of companies. In fact, Reuter reports that the Chinese Sinopec, Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala Investment and the Brazilian companies Ultrapar Participações SA (UGPA3.SA) and Raizen have been chosen to go through to the next phase.
In case Brazil joins OPEC (Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries), OPEC would be the clear winner and Brazil the loser by a long shot, energy research firm Rystad Energy said commenting a recent statement by Brazil’s president Jair Bolsonaro that he would like to see Brazil join OPEC.
Samsung Heavy Industries Company Limited (SHI) has agreed to pay penalties amounting to more than $75 million in order to resolve a U.S. government’s investigation into violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. The Department of Justice stated that SHI paid millions of dollars to a Brazilian intermediary knowing that some of the money would be used to bribe high-level executives at Petrobras to obtain a shipbuilding contract.
The largest-ever oil deposits auction of Brazil flopped, as state-controlled Petroleo Brasileiro SA, Petrobras, did most of the bidding while other major oil companies stayed away. Petrobras together with China’s Cnooc Ltd. and China National Oil & Gas Exploration & Development Co. submitted the winning bid for the prize of the auction, the giant Buzios field. Also, Petrobras was the only bidder for the Itapu block, while other oil majors, including Exxon Mobil Corp. didn’t make any bids, also Sepia and Atapu, received no bids.
Petrobras informed that on 26th of August, it detected a leakage of about 5 cubic meters of oily waste in the industrial waste treatment plant of the Abreu e Lima Refinery (Rnest). This comes after 1.2 cubic meter of residual oil leaked from the FPSO ‘Cidade do Rio de Janeiro’, at the Espadarte field in Brazil, during the weekend.
Brazilian Petrobras informed that it will carry out tests starting in June, aiming to evaluate the production of 2020 sulphur cap compliant fuel. As the company said, it does not know the exact viscosity, but it expects it to be lower. During April, Petrobras produced its first set of 0.5% sulphur fuel oil, from its Isaac Sabba refinery in Manaus. The fuel had 0.34% sulphur content, viscosity of 323cst at 50°C and density of 932.7 kg/m3 at 15°C.
