MOBILE, Alabama -- Cleanup crews swarmed across Gulf Coast Asphalt Company’s riverfront property Friday, racing to scoop up tens of thousands of gallons of heavy fuel oil before the arrival of Tropical Storm Lee.
Showing posts with label Oil. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Oil. Show all posts
Oil falls to near $88 ahead of key US jobs report
Oil prices fell to near $88 a barrel Friday as investors awaited a key jobs report later in the day for evidence about the strength of the U.S. economy.
By early afternoon in Europe, benchmark oil for October delivery was down 73 cents to $88.20 in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Crude rose 12 cents to settle at $88.93 on Thursday.
In London, Brent crude for October delivery was down 48 cents at $113.87 on the ICE Futures exchange.
Crude was bolstered by signs industrial production in the U.S. continues to expand. The Institute for Supply Management said Thursday that U.S. manufacturing grew for the 25th straight month while analysts had expected a contraction.
Investors will be closely watching the latest data later Friday from the Labor Department on the U.S. jobs market. Analysts are expecting employers added 93,000 jobs last month.
Oil pipeline opponents protest at White House
Wrapping up two weeks of demonstrations against a proposed oil pipeline from Canada to Mexico, opponents claimed 244 arrests Saturday during another sit-in along Pennsylvania Avenue.
The protesters want President Obama to kill the Keystone XL pipeline, proposed to run through the United States as it carries oil from the tar sands of Canada to the Gulf of Mexico.
Local firm opens to help complete BP oil spill claims
FORT WALTON BEACH — It has been more than a year BP pledged to make it right after last year’s oil spill, yet numerous local residents and businesses continue to be frustrated with the claims process.
A new business at the Publix shopping center downtown is designed to help ease those frustrations. Gulf Coast Facilitators opened last week to assist individuals and businesses properly file claims with the Gulf Coast Claims Facility.
“It is really simple, but you’ve got to understand what they want,” said Frank Ellis, owner of Gulf Coast Facilitators. “You’ve got to look at it from a different perspective, as if you were to pay the claim. They’re trying to pay people, but we know they only want to pay legitimate people. There have been people with fraudulent claims. We all know that.”
The eight-member staff assisted more than 70 clients in the business’ first week.
Ellis had worked at Gulf Coast Representation, a similar business that opened in Panama City last December. After seeing many customers come from Okaloosa County, he decided to open his own business in Fort Walton Beach.
Ellis still works closely with Gulf Coast Representation; the companies refer customers to one another.
Ali Salman, owner of Gulf Coast Representation, said a lot of the people who have had their claims denied thus far are “not submitting the correct documentation.”
“We have not had any problems with BP or the GCCF,” Salman said. “They have been paying these claims and they have been doing a great job of paying them to us. We’ve been getting a huge success rate.”
Some of the problems are as simple as people not signing and dating forms or having their documentation in the right format. The main thing the businesses’ staffs have noticed is that claimants are not submitting proof that the oil spill harmed them financially.
“BP and the GCCF love what we’re doing because we’re giving them the claims in their format,” Salman said. “BP wants to pay these claims. I know it sounds hard to believe, but they want to pay these claims. But when someone’s giving them inaccurate information, it’s a lot of problems.
“We’ve had more problems with actual claimants than we have with BP or the GCCF,” he added. “They have been very easy to deal with, very straight forward.”
Gulf Coast Facilitators and Gulf Coast Representation keep a percentage of the claims payments they collect, usually between 15 and 20 percent. If a claim is denied, their client is not charged.
Salman said customers sometimes insist that the company submit a claim request even if they do not have all of the documentation, knowing it will likely be rejected. Of the legitimate claims they have submitted with all the paperwork correctly filed, only one has not been paid yet.
“I was extremely skeptical until the checks came in the mail,” Salman said. “Once the checks came in the mail, I was like ‘Wow, these people really do what they say and say what they mean.’ ”
A new business at the Publix shopping center downtown is designed to help ease those frustrations. Gulf Coast Facilitators opened last week to assist individuals and businesses properly file claims with the Gulf Coast Claims Facility.
“It is really simple, but you’ve got to understand what they want,” said Frank Ellis, owner of Gulf Coast Facilitators. “You’ve got to look at it from a different perspective, as if you were to pay the claim. They’re trying to pay people, but we know they only want to pay legitimate people. There have been people with fraudulent claims. We all know that.”
The eight-member staff assisted more than 70 clients in the business’ first week.
Ellis had worked at Gulf Coast Representation, a similar business that opened in Panama City last December. After seeing many customers come from Okaloosa County, he decided to open his own business in Fort Walton Beach.
Ellis still works closely with Gulf Coast Representation; the companies refer customers to one another.
Ali Salman, owner of Gulf Coast Representation, said a lot of the people who have had their claims denied thus far are “not submitting the correct documentation.”
“We have not had any problems with BP or the GCCF,” Salman said. “They have been paying these claims and they have been doing a great job of paying them to us. We’ve been getting a huge success rate.”
Some of the problems are as simple as people not signing and dating forms or having their documentation in the right format. The main thing the businesses’ staffs have noticed is that claimants are not submitting proof that the oil spill harmed them financially.
“BP and the GCCF love what we’re doing because we’re giving them the claims in their format,” Salman said. “BP wants to pay these claims. I know it sounds hard to believe, but they want to pay these claims. But when someone’s giving them inaccurate information, it’s a lot of problems.
“We’ve had more problems with actual claimants than we have with BP or the GCCF,” he added. “They have been very easy to deal with, very straight forward.”
Gulf Coast Facilitators and Gulf Coast Representation keep a percentage of the claims payments they collect, usually between 15 and 20 percent. If a claim is denied, their client is not charged.
Salman said customers sometimes insist that the company submit a claim request even if they do not have all of the documentation, knowing it will likely be rejected. Of the legitimate claims they have submitted with all the paperwork correctly filed, only one has not been paid yet.
“I was extremely skeptical until the checks came in the mail,” Salman said. “Once the checks came in the mail, I was like ‘Wow, these people really do what they say and say what they mean.’ ”
Number of the Week: How Many Rigs Are Drilling for Oil?
The figure reflects a huge surge in U.S. oil drilling, up nearly 60% in the past year and the highest total since at least 1987, when oil services company Baker Hughes Inc. began keeping track.The drilling boom is being driven by a variety of factors. New technologies have allowed companies to tap vast new oil reserves in places like North Dakota, Texas and, most recently, Ohio. High oil prices are making once-unprofitable fields more tempting. And low natural-gas prices are leading companies to shift their focus to finding oil. Natural-gas drilling, which generally uses the same rigs but in different places, is down 8% in the past year.
All that drilling is helping to boost U.S. oil production. The U.S. pumped 3.9 million barrels a day from onshore fields in March, up 5.9% from a year earlier and the most in nearly a decade.
BP oil spill fund: $5 billion in claims paid out
The BP oil spill fund for the Gulf of Mexico has paid out $5 billion of $20 billion set aside for recovery, claims administrator Kenneth Feinberg says.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- The fund to compensate Gulf Coast businesses and residents for damages from last year's BP oil spill says it has paid out $5 billion of the $20 billion set aside for recovery.
The Gulf Coast Claims Facility, which took over the claims process from BP in August 2010, has approved 38% of the 947,892 claims submitted, according to an executive summary it released Tuesday.
The fund, which has employed as many as 3,000 people, has received claims from all 50 states and 36 countries.
The vast majority of the claims paid have gone to five states. Florida residents and businesses have been paid $2 billion, more than any other state. Louisiana recipients have been paid $1.5 billion. Recipients from Alabama, Mississippi and Texas round out the top five, respectively.
The historic environmental disaster was the worst oil spill in U.S. history, claiming 11 lives and spewing over 200 million gallons of oil into the Gulf.
The spill had wide-ranging economic consequences in the region. Businesses such as fishing, oyster harvesting and charter fishing boats, were impacted directly by oil in the water. Restaurants, hotels and rental properties that depend on tourism money saw a drop-off in sales, even in cases where there was no oil visible on the beaches.
Oil rises on anticipation Fed may signal stimulus
Major stocks indexes rose more than 2 percent as investors jumped into the market before a highly anticipated address by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke later this week in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, where policymakers and academics meet once a year.
Some investors expect Bernanke to signal more Fed quantitative easing measures ahead to stimulate a sluggish U.S. economy.
Weekly Crude Oil Fundamental Analysis August 22-26, 2011
By CommoditiesMansion.com – Crude oil prices dropped last week, as pessimism dominated markets amid the huge uncertainty that continued to surround markets, where slowing economic activities in the United States sparked concerns the world’s largest economy is on its way to a double dip recession, while mounting fears from the European debt crisis, as European banks seem to be having a liquidity crisis, which boosted demand for lower yielding assets, and accordingly putting crude oil prices under pressure and pushed prices to the downside.
Shell's reputation hit by North Sea oil spill
LONDON — Royal Dutch Shell struggled to contain the worst North Sea oil spill in a decade as well as damage to its credibility Tuesday as a second leak was found in an oil line the company had said was "under control."Although the amount of oil involved in the Shell spill off the coast of Scotland is an order of magnitude smaller than BP's 2010 Gulf of Mexico disaster - around 1,300 barrels so far compared to an estimated 4.9 million in the Gulf - the spill undercuts Shell's earlier suggestions that it is a safer company than BP.
The Gannet Alpha oil rig, 112 miles (180 kilometers) east of the Scottish city of Aberdeen, is operated by Shell and co-owned by Shell and Esso, a subsidiary of the U.S. oil firm Exxon Mobil. Shell first told U.K. authorities about a leak in a flow line at the rig on Wednesday.
Shell shut down the main leak by closing the well and isolating the reservoir, said Glen Cayley, technical director of Shell's European exploration and production activities. However, he acknowledged that a second, smaller leak at the rig has proved more elusive to control.
"It has proved difficult to find the exact source of the leak because we are dealing with a complex subsea infrastructure and the leak seems to be coming from an awkward place surrounded by marine growth," he said late Tuesday.
"We face a number of technical challenges to ensure that there is no further release of hydrocarbons to the sea, so we are working on this methodically and carefully."
He said the secondary spill is now pumping less than one barrel - or 42 gallons - into the cold water each day.
Greenland posts Cairn oil spill plan to combat fears
* Greenland publishes Cairn Energy's oil spill plan
* Acts to calm environmental fears over Arctic exploration
* Says authorities can take action 5 km around rig
COPENHAGEN, Aug 16 (Reuters) - Greenland has published British explorer Cairn Energy's oil spill response plan in a bid to calm fears about Arctic exploration after environmental group Greenpeace demanded that it be made public.
It also said it had new options to act against any unlawful attempts by protesters to interfere with oil rigs.
Greenpeace, which has tried to disrupt drilling off Greenland, argues that cleaning up a spill in the Arctic waters there would be extremely difficult.
Greenland's government had initially withheld the oil spill contingency plan drawn up by Cairn because it feared activists could launch more actions against rigs if it were published.
Greenland, a semi-autonomous part of the kingdom of Denmark, said the Danish foreign ministry had determined that under the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea the Greenland authorities can take action within a radius of 5 km from a safety zone around oil rigs.
"These new options available will make it easier for the authorities to take measures in relation to unlawful actions against the safety measures of the drilling rigs," the Greenland government said in a statement on its website.
newIrving Oil concerns pushed gas prices up
Irving Oil Ltd. is denying having any production outages at its Saint John-based oil refinery after concerns of problems caused gasoline prices to spike up on Thursday.Carolyn Van der Veen, a spokeswoman for Irving Oil, said in an email on Friday that the refinery suffered a "minor upset" on Thursday.
"But there are no production problems at the refinery. It's normal operations here and business as usual," Van der Veen said in an email.
While Irving Oil is denying any ongoing problems at its New Brunswick refinery, concerns over possible production issues caused gasoline markets in New York to spike upward on Thursday.
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