Ecuador
oil exports in turmoil as protests continue
AFP
QUITO
Petroleumworld.com
02 22 06
Protesters demanding a bigger cut in oil profits for the Amazon
region took over a privately owned pipeline pumping station in
on Tuesday, even as another group abandoned another government-owned
pumping station.
The Sardinas pumping station in Napo province was "violently"
taken over by protesters, halting operations on the Heavy Crude
Pipeline (OCP), a spokesman for the consortium of oil companies
operating the line told AFP.
The oil line can deliver up to 450,000 barrels of crude a day
from the Amazon jungle to the Pacific coast for the US-based Occidental
Petroleum, Spain's Repsol and Canada's Encana.
The spokesman said the takeover "did not affect yet"
the crude exports of the companies that share the line, but did
affect the delivery of the equivalent of 160,000 barrels of crude.
The takeover of the Sardinas pumping station coincided with the
re-starting of pumping operations on a separate oil pipeline owned
by the government oil consortium Petroecuador.
Protesters damaged a pumping station on that line in the Amazon,
causing an 11 million dollar loss in oil sales, according to Petroecuador.
Crude oil began loading on ships in the northeastern port of Balao
at 2100 GMT Tuesday, the state run firm said in a statement.
Damages to installations in the Amazonian province of Napo forced
Petroecuador to shut down its main pipeline early Monday, after
protesters occupied a pumping station and briefly took a group
of technicians hostage.
The pipeline ships 380,000 barrels a day from the Amazon to Balao,
near the Colombian border.
The protest stopped the export of 275,000 barrels of crude, "causing
the country a loss of 11 million dollars," the Petroecuador
statement said.
Oil installations in eastern Ecuador have come under pressure
from local inhabitants who demand a crackdown on alleged corruption
by big oil companies and a greater share of the country's oil
wealth.
A similar protest last August stopped Ecuador's daily exports
of crude oil for two weeks.
Ecuador, with 532,000 barrels of oil extracted per day, is Latin
America's fifth largest oil producer. Thirty-seven percent is
extracted by Petroecuador, the rest by private companies.
AFP
02 22 06
Copyright
© 2006 AFP. All rights reserved
Send
this story to a friend
Your
feedback is important to us!
We invite all our readers to share with us
their views and comments about this article.
Write
to editor@petroleumworld.com
Any
question or suggestions, please write to:
editor@petroleumworld.com
Best
Viewed with IE
5.01+
Windows
NT 4.0, '95, '98 and ME +/ 800x600 pixels
|
|
