The Environment section of national newspaper El Espectador devoted nearly a full page of today’s edition to a report (from Spain’s El País) on a 5.7 magnitude quake in Prague, Oklahoma in 2011. The El País story in turn is based on a report in Geology magazine which concludes the quake was caused by the accumulated impact of 20 years of water reinjection from a conventional gas well. The photo used to illustrate the story, and indeed most of the story, has to do with the fracking debate and the relevance of this incident to nonconventional hydrocarbons development.
The dispute between the USO and Oxy is grinding away. On the one hand, the USO continues to complain that management is not listening and on the other, holding out the olive branch to continue to extend the dialogues. Last week between a holiday on Monday and then the traditional Colombian Easter holiday from Wednesday noon, the negotiating teams no doubt did not accomplish very much.
This was Holy Week in Colombia, Easter in the Christian calendar, and by luck it corresponded this year with a holiday on Monday, March 25. This meant most of Colombia was on vacation virtually the whole week and the Armed Forces turned their focus to ensuring there were no embarrassing incidents affecting tourists. Lining the roads with soldiers when city dwellers are on the highways is also good publicity. Incidents were down this week to 34, below the long term average.
Orlando Cabrales attended a conference in Argentina on unconventional hydrocarbons a few weeks ago just as he was transitioning from being head of the National Hydrocarbons Agency (ANH) to being Vice-minister of Energy.
Our Monthly Report for March 2013 is now available for download (see below). We have a guest commentary on gas pricing by Felipe Villegas Gómez, León Teicher gives his opinion on best practices for managing community relations and monthly collaborator Tomás de la Calle writes on the economics of exporting oil from Colombia.
The oil & gas and mining companies currently present in Colombia complain, rightfully so, about the lack of coordination between the various ministries and institutions of the state, which inevitably generate delays and uncertainty for their business.