Previously in 2025 CNOOC Ltd. announced three startups in the Bohai Sea and three in the South China Sea. The Bohai Sea projects are the Caofeidian 6-4 oilfield adjustment, phase 2 of the Luda 5-2 North field and the Bozhong 26-6 field. The South China Sea projects are Wenchang 19-1 oilfield phase 2, the Dongfang 29-1 field and the Panyu 11-12/10-1/10-2 Oilfield Adjustment Joint Development Project.
The global oil market has been rocked in recent months by the move from eight core OPEC+ nations to relax supply restraints at a faster-than-expected pace, potentially adding supplies just as trade frictions menace demand. The surprise shift has been presented as a bid by the cartel to reclaim market share from rival drillers, as well as punish its own quota cheats.
“We identified BBSS as an opportunity to make a step change in operational safety through making it easier and more user-friendly for personnel to participate and allowing us to make more effective use of the resulting leading data. It provides full visibility of engagement in our safety reporting and real-time data, giving us immediate insight into reported issues and the ability to act swiftly for the best outcomes in our operations”, EnQuest’s Director of HSE and Wells, Ian McKimmie, added.
Over the first four months of 2025, China produced 1.58 billion tons of coal, which was 6.6% higher than the output booked for the same period a year earlier. In April alone, China produced 3.8% more coal than a year ago, at 389.31 million tons. This was down from a month earlier when production hit a record, but still strong enough to cement coal’s role in the country’s energy mix.
For 2025, the company lowered its production outlook and said it would keep capital expenditure at 2024 levels, but going forward, it said there were more record-breaking plans in production for the next two years. In 2025, the capital expenditure for exploration in China will mainly be directed to sustain crude oil reserves while expanding natural gas reserves, led by the construction of the three trillion-cubic-meters-level gas regions, CNOOC said in January, as it continues to follow China’s directive to state majors to boost domestic oil and gas reserves and supply.
A week ago, the 39th OPEC and non-OPEC Ministerial Meeting was held via videoconference, chaired by Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman Al-Saud, Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Energy. According to a press release, the group pledged to “develop a mechanism to assess the maximum sustainable production capacity (MSC) of member countries that will be used as reference for 2027 production baselines”.
It has been over two years since the Baghdad-based Federal Government of Iraq (FGI) placed an embargo on independent oil exports from the Erbil-based Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI). The legal basis for the halting of these essential flows to the finances of the semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan was the International Chamber of Commerce’s (ICC) order that they would not be resumed until Turkey paid the FGI the US$1.5 billion in damages for these allegedly unauthorised oil exports over many previous years.
With crude oil prices dropping into the low $60s per barrel, profitability in the oil and gas industry is under pressure, squeezing cash flows and forcing companies to reassess their capital allocation. As a result, upstream investments are expected to decline. Early signals from the peer group of majors support this trend, as they indicate plans to prioritize shareholder returns—particularly dividends and buybacks—over new investments.
Kazakhstan’s national oil and gas company KazMunayGas is looking to borrow cheaper funds from overseas debt issues, including bonds denominated in Chinese yuan, the firm’s chief executive Askhat Khassenov told Bloomberg.
“We looked at all options. Currently there is a possibility to sell dim sum, panda bonds,” Khassenov said in an interview with Bloomberg published on Wednesday.
Viper Energy has agreed to acquire Sitio Royalties in a deal valued at USD 4.1 billion, the company said on Wednesday.
The acquisition will position Viper as a leading publicly traded mineral and royalty company in North America, significantly enhancing its scale, asset base and access to capital.