The central government is considering more relief measures for the hydrocarbons industry to create incentives for more investment in exploration through a rehash of its energy policies.
The low price of oil is putting Colombia’s biofuels industry and future investments for it at risk says the National Federation of Biofuels (Fedebiocombustibles), although Ecopetrol’s (NYSE:EC) biofuel unit Bioenergy says it will move forward will an expansion of sugar cane crops for fuels and a long delayed plant.
The number of attacks on oil infrastructure has dropped considerably, in fact in January and February only two were reported, but 2014 showed that the guerrilla’s methods remain very effective despite lowered activity.
Ecopetrol (NYSE:EC) says it has a contingency workforce and that a strike by the USO oil workers union would be illegal and could lead to dismissals. Meanwhile the union is preparing a 24 hours strike for March 19, which could be expanded into an indefinite one.
Nunchía authorities agreed to expedite the disbursement of CoP$1B (US$380,000) for electrification and gas coverage expansion from the Bicentennial Pipeline while the ANH and UN Development Program have started workshops to improve community relationships with the industry. These and other stories on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in our periodic summary.
Parex Resources (TSX:PXT) posted strong production gains in 2014 through acquisitions and organic growth, hitting 22,526boed average for the year, a 42% increase over 2013. However struck by the fall in world oil prices, the company reported a net loss for the year of US$108.8M although more than 100% of this was due to a non-cash write down of assets in Colombia and Trinidad.
Incident counts went up significantly this week to 33 but qualitatively we are still in the same ‘quieter’ period with respect to guerrilla-initiated activities.
The Casanare administrative court will inspect Mate Marrano wetlands after The National Environmental Licensing Agency (ANLA) did not show for a hearing, and authorities say that thus far Paz de Ariporo is not suffering from drought conditions like last year. These and other environmental stories in our periodic summary.
Pacific Rubiales (TSX:PRE) delivered a proposal which would keep it in the Rubiales field following the end of its association contract, offering a give and take to Ecopetrol (NYSE:EC) based on its ability to improve secondary recovery, expand the number of wells and implement new technologies.
In the National Infrastructure Congress scheduled for November of this year the government will present a strategy to rely on multimodal transportation that puts more emphasis on alternatives to trucks such as trains or rivers, says the president of the Colombian Infrastructure Chamber (CCI) Juan Martín Caicedo.
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