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AfrOil NEWSBASE GLOBAL ROUNDUP (NRG) AfrOil

NRG: Cautious steps forward

Oil companies are looking to move ahead with plans that were stymied by low prices and weak demand

COMMENTARY WELCOME to the seventh edition of News- overseas, as it shores up its production figures in
Base’s Roundup Global (NRG), in which our the face of declining domestic potential. Since
team of international editors provide you with a peaking at 489,000 barrels per day in 2016, Thai-
snapshot of some of the key issues affecting their land’s oil production slowly declined to 477,000
regional beats. Get the NRG Oil & Gas Editor’s bpd in 2019, according to BP’s Statistical Review
Picks to your inbox every week for free. Just sign of World Energy 2020.
up here. After unveiling plans to slash its capital
Oil prices have remained relatively stable so expenditure budget in April, owing to the twin
far in June. This is among the factors prompt- pressures of collapsing oil prices and the coro-
ing oil and gas players around the world to move navirus (COVID-19) pandemic’s destruction of
cautiously forward with plans that have been demand, PTTEP believes now is the right time to
complicated by the market downturn and the go bargain hunting.
collapse in global demand. PTTEP wants to open talks with financially
Some companies are using this opportunity troubled upstream players, company CEO and
to snap up assets on the cheap, while others are president Phongsthorn Thavisin told the Bang-
merely starting to restore production that has kok Post on June 19. He added that the firm was
been shut in over recent months. Meanwhile, interested in assets in Southeast Asia and the
news of more “carbon neutral” cargoes of lique- Middle East.
fied natural gas (LNG) illustrates that the energy He said: “We should not close our eyes to a
transition remains a significant driver of new big chance in these regions. But if opportunity
industry developments. emerges elsewhere, we must first make sure we
have prospective buyers [for our oil] in those
Asia: Thai asset spending spree regions.”
Thailand’s PTT Exploration and Production The company believes it can afford to splash
(PTTEP) is aiming to use the same adverse busi- out on new assets, having built up a sizeable war
ness conditions that forced it to cut its invest- chest in recent years while slashing operating
ment plans to expand its upstream portfolio. costs. Thavisin said PTTEP had $3bn of cash
The state-run oil and gas developer has on hand and could also raise additional funding
announced plans to use the current downturn in should the right deal come along.
international oil and gas prices to snap up energy The company has focused on cutting its cost
assets, highlighting both the near and far abroad base in the years following the last oil price crash
as of interest. in 2014. Indeed, Thavisin said in April that the
PTTEP has acquired a number of new oil company’s per unit costs amounted to $31.7 per
and gas fields in recent years, both at home and barrel.

P6 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 25 24•June•2020