MALAYSIA GONNA START CHANGING PETROL PRICE EVERY WEEK? WON’T THAT SUSAHKAN US MORE?

April 18, 2017

Dateline 2017-03-14, Cilisos:

Just 3 years ago, Malaysia was still a country with petrol subsidies, but that all changed when the gomen decided they weren’t going to pay for those subsidies anymore. Malaysia then moved to a float system, where the prices of petrol locally would be determined monthly by the prices worldwide.

For the longest time, our Editor-In-Chief had been wanting for one of us writers to write about how these monthly petrol prices in Malaysia are calculated. Sadly, it kept getting postponed either because of something more current or we just forgot. In fact, our saudara at SOSCILI ended up writing about it before us.

With the price of petrol and diesel going up in the past 2 months, we thought it would be a good time to translate their article. But as soon as this writer started researching about the topic, we realised that some major changes are coming where petrol prices are concerned.


Saturday Star 2017-04-15 – Job Opportunities

April 17, 2017

Happy The Last Jedi trailer week. IGL has pivoted into training, so book your seats now.

We’re thinking of republishing Young Turks of PETRONAS, but it’s a minimum 500 book printing run. Do I have enough interested persons to purchase?

Donate to your favorite charity (me), buy my recommendations, or through my Amazon store. Or get the Young Turks series (3 books until I can get YTP republished). Where are those corporate sponsors? Or throw donations at me, my camera dive case flooded, and I need a new replacement. Heck, if you want to send me a Canon 5D Mk III plus dive case, I will not say no.

  • KPOC is looking for a Project Engineer, Control and Instrumentation Reliability Engineer. Visit their LinkedIn page or email them here.
  • I have a feeling that The Star isn’t the preferred O&G job recruitment portal now. I see more adverts via social media. What do you think, is it a step change that the papers need to embrace?
  • I’m looking for jobs for 3Q2017. Send me your POs.

Food choice of the week? The nostalgic food stall, near your parents home. McD Bangsar Baru does not count.

Seeing that Joe Dever has passed away, you may want to revisit his books:

Flight from the Dark (Lone Wolf, Book 1), Legends of Lone Wolf Omnibus 1, War of the Wizards (The World of Lone Wolf, Book 4)


No way out but to consolidate

April 16, 2017

Less than 4,000 SWEC licensed companies? There must be more SWEC registered companies.

Dateline 2017-04-06, The Edge:

Consolidation in the Malaysian oil and gas (O&G) industry — which had 3,956 Petronas-licensed companies as at 2015 — is deemed necessary to brave the current industry downturn.

“Malaysia is an O&G country and it is fundamental for us to develop the industry so that it can remain strong even post-downturn,” Malaysian Offshore Vessels Owners’ Association president Amir Hamzah Azizan told The Edge Financial Daily during an exclusive briefing organised by Malaysia Petroleum Resources Corp.

“Not all companies will survive because there is just not enough [work] to help them sustain. We should encourage the right partnerships to support and build capable local O&G players to compete and survive in this sphere,” he said.

To elaborate, Amir said when a big cake has shrunk to be a cupcake, the share would have to go to the efficient players so that they would be stronger to shape up the industry.


Malaysia to implement Euro 4M specifications for 95 RON gasoline in Oct 2018

April 12, 2017

Dateline 2017-03-01, S&P Global:

Malaysia has set a timeline of October 1, 2018 to implement Euro 4M gasoline specifications for the 95 RON grade in the country, according to a Malaysian government official.

Malaysia implemented Euro 4M for 97 RON gasoline at retail stations in September 2015, but has yet to make the switch for 95 RON gasoline.

The country plans to implement Euro 5-compliant fuels for 95 RON and 97 RON gasoline on September 1, 2025, and Euro 5 diesel on September 1, 2020, according to the country’s clean fuels roadmap, said Datuk Shahrol Halmi, director of Oil, Gas & Energy at the Performance Management and Delivery Unit in the Prime Minister’s Department.

Oil companies are free to introduce Euro 4M and Euro 5 gasoline and diesel specifications earlier than the stipulated timeline, Halmi said.


Saturday Star 2017-04-08 – Job Opportunities

April 10, 2017

Happy Wata  is an IEM Council Member Week (and Ir. Abdu Razak Yakob as well), IEM AGM and Annual Dinner. IGL has pivoted into training, so book your seats now.

We’re thinking of republishing Young Turks of PETRONAS, but it’s a minimum 500 book printing run. Do I have enough interested persons to purchase?

Donate to your favorite charity (me), buy my recommendations, or through my Amazon store. Or get the Young Turks series (3 books until I can get YTP republished). Where are those corporate sponsors? Or throw donations at me, my camera dive case flooded, and I need a new replacement. Heck, if you want to send me a Canon 5D Mk III plus dive case, I will not say no.

  • I have a feeling that The Star isn’t the preferred O&G job recruitment portal now. I see more adverts via social media. What do you think, is it a step change that the papers need to embrace?
  • I’m looking for jobs for 3Q2017. Send me your POs.

Food choice of the week? The nostalgic food stall, near your parents home. McD Bangsar Baru does not count.

Seeing that Joe Dever has passed away, you may want to revisit his books:

Flight from the Dark (Lone Wolf, Book 1), Legends of Lone Wolf Omnibus 1, War of the Wizards (The World of Lone Wolf, Book 4)


Octanex selects FPSO for Ophir oil field development offshore Malaysia

April 5, 2017

Dateline 2017-03-01, Your Oil and Gas News:

Octanex advises that a donor vessel has been secured for conversion into an FPSO for use on the Ophir field, with conversion works to commence shortly.

MTC Engineering (MTCE), an experienced Malaysian oil and gas marine contractor, has purchased an oil tanker, Puteri Bangsa, for conversion into the MTC Ledang FPSO. Engineering design works for the conversion are well advanced and conversion works on the tanker will shortly commence.

The MTC Ledang FPSO will have a small process facility module with capacity for 15,000 barrels of fluid per day and gas flaring and will be capable of storing up to 350,000 barrels of crude. It will be anchored to the seabed at the Ophir field and connected to the Ophir platform via a flexible 8” pipeline. It is contracted to be at the Ophir field at a competitive rate for a period of three years, with a one year extension option.


IEM Shout Out – 2017-05 One-Day Course on Shell and Tube Heat Exchanger Design

April 4, 2017

My technical division will be hosting a 1 day course on the 2nd May 2017. It is worth 6.5 CPD points, and held at Wisma IEM. The course will be presented by Ir. Anwar Ahmad. Process engineers, can you please attend?

During this Shell and Tube Heat Exchanger Thermal Design course, there will be overview on the thermal design for designing shell and tube heat exchanger by considering design, operational, and maintenance perspective. The design of the heat exchanger is extremely important, as it is the key element of a heat-exchanged system. This is not only on the desired temperature to achieve during operation but also when considering the optimum design prior procuring an exchanger. Furthermore, properly designed heat exchanger can reduce the turn-down time for maintenance as no frequent cleaning is required while operating the plant or platform. Technologies involved in this thermal technology will be discussed during the workshop to highlight the importance and advantages when designing and operating shell and tube heat exchanger (STHE).

Ir. Anwar Ahmad is a registered Professional Engineer with Board of Engineer (BEM), Corporate Member with Institute of Engineers, Malaysia (IEM), Corporate Member with Institute of Chemical Engineers, UK (IChemE), Chartered Engineer from Engineering Council, UK with more than twelve (12) years experiences in process engineering in oil and gas industry, mainly in design with engineering firm and operation for technical support during turn around.  He started his career in fabrication yard with Sime Darby Engineering as graduate process engineer supported pre-commissioning team. Later he joined Petronas as process engineer and his responsibility was to provide technical support to OPUs throughout Petronas. One of his major assignment besides projects assigned was support one of the refinery during turn around. During this support, he had vast experience on operational issues that had been implemented in design stage when he joined engineering firms later.  He then joined engineering firms (Technip, Ranhill WorleyParsons, etc) based on project basis to execute any project varies from conceptual study, pre-FEED, FEED, detailed design, and EPCC. His role when execution projects are mainly responsible to carry out detailed process engineering tasks such as development of PFDs, UFDs, P&IDs, heat and material balance (process simulation), equipment sizing, relief and blowdown analysis, and hydraulic calculations. Also involved in various safety review such as Process Safeguarding Diagram, HAZOP, and SIL workshop. Experienced in process simulations (Hysys, PetroSim, and VMGSim/iCON), heat exchanger rating software (HTRI), flare network backpressure software (FlareNet/Aspen Flare System Analyzer), and flare radiation study software (FlareSim). Familiar and experienced in using oil and gas industry standards (API,  ASTM, etc.) and company standards such as Petronas’ PTS, Shell’s DEP and Iranian Petroleum Standard. Familiar with Exxon’s DIM. He’s currently freelance process engineer attached to engineering firms based requirement basis when executing projects and also execute projects remotely if required.

Register here, or download the form here.


Saturday Star 2017-04-01 – Job Opportunities

April 3, 2017

Happy Wata  IEM VP and Council Candidacy. Vote for me, and spread the word, wilya? IGL has pivoted into training, so book your seats now.

We’re thinking of republishing Young Turks of PETRONAS, but it’s a minimum 500 book printing run. Do I have enough interested persons to purchase?

Donate to your favorite charity (me), buy my recommendations, or through my Amazon store. Or get the Young Turks series (3 books until I can get YTP republished). Where are those corporate sponsors? Or throw donations at me, my camera dive case flooded, and I need a new replacement. Heck, if you want to send me a Canon 5D Mk III plus dive case, I will not say no.

  • I have a feeling that The Star isn’t the preferred O&G job recruitment portal now. I see more adverts via social media. What do you think, is it a step change that the papers need to embrace?
  • I’m looking for jobs for 3Q2017. Send me your POs.

Food choice of the week? The nostalgic food stall, near your parents home. McD Bangsar Baru does not count.

Seeing that Joe Dever has passed away, you may want to revisit his books:

Flight from the Dark (Lone Wolf, Book 1), Legends of Lone Wolf Omnibus 1, War of the Wizards (The World of Lone Wolf, Book 4)


Linkbait – PETRONAS Activity Outlook 2017-2019

March 30, 2017

Hot off the press! Actually, not so hot, I was privileged to see a preview about 3 weeks ago. We thank PETRONAS for sharing this information to us, the minions.

Also, is it a coincidence this came out on the first day of the weekly petrol price setting regime?

PETRONAS Activity Outlook 2017-2019

PETRONAS Activity Outlook FAQ


Spotlight on Hibiscus Petroleum

March 30, 2017

Dateline 2016-02-22, Daily Express:

There is increased interest in Hibiscus Petroleum Bhd due to imminent regulatory approval for its propsed acquistion of a 50pc stake in four offshore oilfields in Sabah from Shell.

Hibiscus earkier announced it had entered into a conditional sale and purchase agreement with Sabah Shell Petroleum Company Ltd and Shell Sabah Selatan Sdn Bhd to acquire Shell’s entire 50pc interest in the 2011 North Sabah enhanced oil recovery production-sharing contract (PSC) for US$25 mil (RM 111mil).

The PSC comprises four producing oilfields namely, the St Joseph, South Furious, SF30, and Barton oilfields, and associated infrastructure such as pipeline infrastructure and the Labuan Crude Oil Terminal.

The purchase is subject to regulatory approval of Petroliam Nasional Bhd (Petronas) and the consent of Petronas Carigali Sdn Bhd, a 50pc joint venture partner in the PSC. If approval is gained, the acquisition is likely to be completed in the middle of the year.

Hibiscus managing director Kenneth Pereira declined to comment on the likelihood that Petronas will give its approval for the stake buy soon.