The Turkish Energy Minister Fatih Donmez announced that Yavuz, the Turkish drillship, was planned to start drilling for oil and gas, on Monday 7 or Tuesday 8 October in the southwest of Cyprus, an announcement that would further intensify the friction between the countries.
The State of California will delay the introduction of strict ballast water quality standards to 2030. These standards are considered to be significantly more strict in comparison to the USCG Final Rule and IMO International Ballast Water Management Convention.
The US and China agreed on the outlines of a partial trade accord on Friday, October 11, according to which China would step up its purchases of US agricultural commodities, agree to certain intellectual-property measures and concessions related to financial services and currency.
Imports at US’s major retail container ports are expected to reach their highest level of the year again next month, just before more tariffs apply in December, according to the Global Port Tracker report released by the National Retail Federation and Hackett Associates.
The Port of Los Angeles managed less containers of imported goods in September, following the ongoing trade war between the US and China, as the US sanctions affected the port given that it is the busiest one for ocean trade with China, as Reuters reports.
Reuters reports that almost a third of the tankers owned by COSCO Shipping Tanker have shut off their AIS systems after the U.S. imposed sanctions on the company for reportedly shipping Iranian crude. In the first week of October, a total of 14 COSCO Dalian ships, including nine VLCCs, have shut off their ship-tracking transponders and have stopped sending location data from their automatic identification system.
A Novatek official reported to Reuters that Novatek, the Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG) producer is looking to tranship its Yamal cargoes in Norway or Russia’s Murmansk, as the company is still unsure of its shipping activities, following the US’s sanctions on the Chinese COSCO tankers.
Freight rates to ship US crude to Asia are still on the rise, with costs to charter a supertanker increasing to a record $12 million on October the 3rd. This development comes as an aftermath of US’s sanction against two units of COSCO, alleging that they were involved in transporting crude out of Iran.
On Sunday, Greek Prime Minister urged the US to take place in the tensions between Greece and Cyprus concerning drilling operations in the Eastern Mediterranean, where Cyprus and Turkey are locked in a dispute over offshore rights.
The Alabama State Port Authority announced that along with the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) signed the Mobile Harbor Pre-Construction, Engineering and Design Agreement that marks the deepening and widening of Alabama’s only deep-water seaport.
