-Halliburton is in talks to buy Baker Hughes, the Wall Street Journal reports. The two oilfield services companies are said to be close to reaching a deal, though the potential price was not yet clear. It is believed Halliburton would pay a premium to Baker Hughes’ market capitalization, which was $21.6 billion as of this afternoon.
-Dow Chemical today said it completed engineering for its on-purpose PDH project in Freeport, Texas, and that construction is more than halfway finished. Dow said its new ethylene production facility in Freeport remains on track to start up in the first half of 2017. Construction began June 30. In addition, the company announced it would expand capacity and enhance production technologies of its four PE units in Bahia Blanca, Argentina.
-Phillips 66 this week announced it would sell its 47% interest in Malaysian Refining Co. Sdn Bhd to Petronas for $635 million. The deal would give Petronas full ownership of the company. Via the Houston Business Journal, Phillips 66 will no longer have a refining presence in Asia after the deal is complete. The acquisition is expected to close Dec. 31. The refinery has a capacity of 170,000 barrels per day and is located in Melaka, Malaysia.
-Houston must educate and train more low-skilled workers for a bounty of new local petrochemical jobs set to open in the coming years, says a new report by JPMorgan Chase & Co. Via FuelFix, more than 120 Texas Gulf Coast petrochemical plants worth $80 billion are slated for construction or scheduled to open. The city’s economy is expected to add 74,000 more middle-skilled jobs per year through 2017. One-fourth of those jobs will come from the petrochemical and commercial and industrial construction sectors, both of which will want to hire the same workers. The report estimates Houston employs 1.4 million middle-skilled workers.
-Meanwhile, the CEOs of coal-fired power generating companies forecast blackouts and higher energy bills under President Obama’s recent climate change pact with China. The U.S. agreed to reduce carbon emissions by at least 26% between 2005 and 2026. Southern Co. CEO Thomas Fanning told Bloomberg the industry is not capable of maintaining a reliable system under that proposal. American Electric Power CEO Nick Akins called it “wishful thinking.”
