殼牌放棄65億美元石化項目
Royal Dutch Shell has scrapped plans for a $6.5bn petrochemicals project with Qatar Petroleum, citing “the current economic climate prevailing in the energy industry”, the oil major said on Wednesday.
荷蘭皇家殼牌(Royal Dutch Shell)週三表示，已經放棄與卡塔爾石油公司(Qatar Petroleum)合作開展一個價值65億美元的石化項目的計劃，原因是“能源行業當前的經濟氣候”。
The Al Karaana project, an 80:20 joint venture between Qatar Petroleum and Shell, would have produced 2m tonnes a year of petrochemicals products, largely intended for Asian markets.
卡塔爾石油公司與殼牌按照80:20出資比例建立的Al Karaana合資項目原本計劃每年生產200萬噸的石化產品，主要供應亞洲市場。The decision not to proceed — a significant move following the halving of oil prices since last summer — was taken “after a careful and thorough evaluation of commercial quotations” from engineering, procurement and construction bidders, Shell said.
殼牌表示，不再推進該項目的決定是在“對工程、採購和建築投標人的商業報價進行審慎而全面的評估之後”做出的。該決定是自去年夏天以來油價下跌50%以後殼牌採取的一個重大舉措。
These showed “high capital costs rendering it commercially unfeasible, particularly in the current economic climate prevailing in the energy industry.”
這些報價表明“高昂的資本成本讓該項目在商業上變得不可行，尤其是在能源行業當前的經濟氣候下”。Crude oil prices have plunged by more than 50 per cent since mid-June, creating winners and losers.
原油價格自去年6月中旬以來下跌逾50%，既讓一部分人受益，也令一部分人蒙受損失。Those who have suffered include producers and governments, whereas some companies stand to benefit from a fall in energy costs. This has encouraged analysts to liken the potential boost for the global economy to a huge programme of “quantitative easing”.
那些蒙受損失的包括生產商和各國政府，然而，有些公司卻因能源成本下降而受益。這促使分析師將油價下跌對全球經濟的潛在提振與龐大的“量化寬鬆”計劃相提並論。For oil companies, the falling price has triggered industry-wide scrutiny of capital spending, with the so-called majors — the biggest groups with upstream and downstream operations — expected to cut billions of dollars from exploration and development projects in the coming year, deferring and even axing programmes.
對石油公司來說，油價下跌引發全行業評估資本支出，那些所謂的石油巨頭（擁有上下游業務的大型集團）預計來年在勘探和開發項目中削減數十億美元支出，延遲甚至放棄某些項目。Under pressure to improve returns following the first profit warning in its history last year, Shell had already embarked on an intense round of cost-cutting before the slide in international crude prices to below $50 a barrel, from more than $110 last summer.
殼牌去年發佈了歷史上首個盈利預警，在提高效益的壓力下，該公司已經在國際油價從去年夏季的每桶逾110美元下跌至50美元之前大刀闊斧地實施了一輪削減成本的舉措。By the end of the third quarter, the Anglo-Dutch major had announced asset disposals of $14bn under a belt-tightening programme initiated by new chief executive Ben van Beurden.
截止去年第三季度末，殼牌按照新任首席執行官範伯登(Ben van Beurden)提出的緊縮項目，宣佈了140億美元的資產處置措施。It has promised to pursue profits over production growth and aims to deliver $30bn to investors through dividends and share buybacks over 2014 and 2015. It said in October it was braced for a sustained price downturn and was now taking further action.
該公司承諾致力於盈利而非產量增長，目標是在2014年和2015年通過股息發放和股票回購向投資者提供300億美元的回報。殼牌在去年10月表示，已經對油價持續下跌有所準備，正在採取進一步的行動。Al Karaana, which took its name from an ancient Qatari village, is an example of the kind of planned spending the oil majors will be paring back. The joint venture to develop a huge complex at Ras Laffan, agreed in December 2011, would have produced 2m tonnes a year of petrochemicals, the bulk of which would have come from a monoethylene glycol plant, the largest of its kind in the world.
以卡塔爾古代的一個村莊命名的Al Karaana項目，就是殼牌即將削減此類計劃支出的一個例子。殼牌與卡塔爾石油公司在2011年12月同意在卡塔爾拉斯拉凡(Ras Laffan)聯合建設一座大型綜合性工廠，每年生產200萬噸的石化產品，其中大部分產品來自一個全球最大的單乙二醇工廠。In March 2013 Fluor of the US won the major front-end engineering and design contract for the project. Feedstock for the plant would have come from natural gas projects in Qatar.
2013年3月，美國福陸公司(Fluor)贏得了該項目主要的前端工程和設計合同。按照計劃，該工廠的原料將來自卡塔爾的天然氣項目。Shell’s existing ventures with Qatar Petroleum, including Pearl GTL, the world’s biggest integrated gas-to-liquids plant, located at Ras Laffan, are unaffected.
殼牌與卡塔爾石油公司的現有合作項目未受影響，包括位於拉斯拉凡、世界上最大的一體化天然氣合成油工廠Pearl GTL。Shares in Shell were down 2.3 per cent at £20.28 in afternoon London trading, following further falls in Brent crude to $46.
在倫敦下午盤交易時段，在布倫特油價進一步跌至46美元之後，殼牌股價下跌2.3%至20.28英鎊。
