JEDDAH: China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), the parent of PetroChina, has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Saudi Aramco during its four-day general manager's visit to Saudi Arabia that ended Tuesday, China Petroleum Daily reported Wednesday. The two companies agreed to expand crude oil trades and strengthen cooperation on refinery and petroleum engineering projects, technology service and equipment supply. Ibrahim Al-Naimi, Saudi minister of petroleum and mineral resources, said Saudi Arabia government will go all out to cooperate with CNPC on oil and gas sector. The Saudi government would fully support any cooperation CNPC, he added. Saudi Arabia exported some 36.66 million metric tons of crude oil to China in the first 10 months. Saudi Aramco holds some 22.5 percent shares in Sinopec SenMei (Fujian) Petroleum Co., Ltd. It is also reportedly in talks with Sinopec on setting up a joint venture refinery in Qingdao, Shandong province. CNPC president Jiang Jiemin talked with Khalid A. Al-Falih, chief executive officer of Saudi Aramco, on expanding oil trading and cooperation in refining and oil engineering fields, it said. Prior his visit to Saudi Arabia, Jiang visited Singapore and met Singapore Prime Minster Lee Hsien Loong, the newspaper said. Singapore is Asia's oil trading hub and home to Singapore Refining Co, jointly owned by PetroChina and Chevron , and the 2.32 million cubic metre Universal Terminal, in which PetroChina has a 35 percent stake. Meanwhile, China's three major state-owned oil companies signed six agreements Wednesday with Venezuela's Ministry of Energy and Petroleum on cooperation in the oil and gas sector, China National Petroleum Corp. said in its in-house newsletter Friday. Jiang signed an agreement with Venezuela's Oil Minister Rafael Ramirez Wednesday on joint venture operations in the Junin 4 block project, it said. CNPC didn't provide any details of the other five agreements, nor did it say how many were signed by China Petrochemical Corp., known as Sinopec Group, or China National Offshore Petroleum Corp., known as CNOOC Group. In April, CNPC's listed unit PetroChina Co. (PTR) signed a memorandum of understanding with Venezuela's state-owned Petroleos de Venezuela SA, known as PDVSA, on cooperation in the Junin 4 block heavy-oil project with a 25-year contract term.The project is expected to produce 2.9 billion metric tons, or 21 billion barrels, of extra-heavy crude oil. PDVSA will control 60 percent of the project and its Chinese counterpart 40 percent. The cost of developing the Junin 4 block could reach $16 billion, Venezuelan officials had said. The Junin 4 project, located within Venezuela's Orinoco heavy oil belt, with total proven oil reserves of 8.7 billion barrels, is expected to have an annual production capacity of 20 million metric tons, or 400,000 barrels per day, CNPC said earlier.
