From Reuters – Malaysia? No Gas!

Taken from Reuters, dateline 2010-02-04:

Malaysia, looking to attract foreign investment, vowed to allocate more of its natural gas output to manufacturers but said it could not provide gas to companies starting new businesses in the Southeast Asian country.

International Trade and Industries Minister Mustapa Mohamad said on Thursday that 100 million standard cubic feet of gas per day, or 5 percent of daily output, would be redistributed to non-power industries until 2011.

There goes my dreams of taking Synergy into the manufacturing industry, sigh… maybe I should hook up some plumbing to the business end of cows, and market that as ‘Malaysia’s gas lifesaver!’. I wonder how much methane they produce? Or should I focus on karibau?

Cheaper RON95 petrol by Mid-Year

Taken from the New Straits Times, Malaysia, dateline 2008-01-09

KUALA LUMPUR: RON95 petrol will be introduced by the middle of this year to provide a cheaper fuel option for the masses.
At the same time, a higher tax will be levied on RON97 to subsidise RON95.

This was revealed by Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Minister Datuk Shahrir Abdul Samad. A chart on how the retail price of petrol is determined will be provided to the public next week.

The chart will help answer queries and explain how the pricing mechanism works.

RON95, although of a higher grade than RON92, will be priced at the same level as RON92.
Shahrir explained that RON95 was a basic grade of petrol which could be used by virtually all vehicles with the exception of some luxury cars.

“We will introduce RON95 by June or July. RON95 is about 10 sen to 11 sen cheaper than RON97. RON92 is currently priced at RM1.70. We will price RON95 at about the same,” he said after launching the Tesco-RHB Credit Card and Tesco-RHB Debit cards in Tesco Ampang yesterday.

Shahrir said the pricing of RON95 would be based on the Automatic Pricing Mechanism (APM). Prior to this, there was no price crisis and there was no need to explain on how the mechanism worked, he said.

The pricing of petrol at kiosks is based on the Mean of Platts Singapore (MOPS), a regional fuel price monitor.

“Should the MOPS price go below US$40 (RM142) a barrel then retail fuel price will fall. If MOPS is above US$78 per barrel, retail fuel price will increase,” he said.

Malaysia Gas Prices – Compare against US Prices

Hah, I found an almost mindless way to compare US pump prices to Malaysian pump prices.

1. Go to gasbuddy.com to get a US pump price. For example, on the 28th of September, 2008, the average price was 2.624/gallon. BTW, the price one month ago was 3.619/gallon.
2. Go to google.com, and type “convert 2.624 dollars per gallon to ringgit per liter,” or whatever the US gallon price is. In this case, the price is equivalent to about RM2.48/liter. This should work for any currency and volume, ex 7,434 Rupiah/liter. Haven’t tried out kolah and ‘tin minyak tanah’ yet.
3. Compare to the Malaysian gas price of RM2.30/liter.

I guess someone will create a Java / AJAX script to link all this up, and alow me to make it an applet on my page?

Proton Malaysia – why no hybrid car?

Let’s start with some prices. Looking at Honda Malaysia:

• RM162.8k for a 1.3l hybrid Civic.
• RM 113.8k for a 1.8s normal Civic.

Apparently, a hybrid is a CBU (completely built up unit), fully imported, which has a higher tax then the CKU (completely knocked down), assembled in Malaysia, normal Civic, in addition to whatever actual cost difference between the two.

Now, in the current regime of crude oil prices north of USD100, why doesn’t Proton get onto the bandwagon, and start developing hybrid cars? Once you get over the capital cost of purchasing a hybrid (and make no mistake, there will be a premium), then we can start reaping the benefits of better fuel efficiency, less smog in Kuala Lumpur’s daily traffic jams, and goodwill from having the national car manufacturer heading green. And possibly think of reducing Malaysia’s oil subsidy.

A look at Proton’s press releases reveals:

• ‘EVE HYBRID’ TECHNOLOGY DEMONSTRATOR SHOWCASES RETRO-INTEGRATION OF HYBRID SOLUTIONS (06/03/2007)
• GEN2 GETS A FACELIFT AND NEW ENGINE (03/03/2008)

So, Proton could have implemented hybrid technology probably by this year, but we have yet to see any commercial models, of which the latest launch was in April 2008. Why is that, I ask? Anyone have any info?

Article ‘Kenapa BN Mahu Sangat Rampas Kelantan’ – Take 2

Continuing my expansion of the above article, I thought I would list down the operators and comments of the acreage listed.

• Blok A18 - as the original author says, the acreage is operated by the Carigali Hess Operating Company (CHOCas its known to friends). It’s located in the Malaysia Thailand Joint Development Area (JDA)
• Blok B17 – the PSC for this area is PETRONAS Carigali (JDA) Sdn Bhd, also in the JDA.
• Block C19 – the PSC for this area is Carigali-PTTEP International Operating Company (CPOC), also in the JDA.
• PM3 – operated by Talisman (Malaysia) Ltd.
• Sub-Blok Ular – operated by PETRONAS Carigali Sdn Bhd (PCSB).
• PM301 & PM302 – CS Mutiara, though I’m not sure if they have had to relinquish the acerage yet. It’s interesting to note that this aceragetouches the Kelantanese shoreline.
• PM303 – Shell, PSC awarded in 1999, though yet to produce.
• PM311 & 312 – joint venture between Murphy Peninsular Malaysia Oil Co Ltdand PCSB, yet to produce.

So, of the fields listed by the author, 3 are in the JDA, one is in Kelantanese waters, and the rest are in Terengganu waters.

It’s interesting to note that we do not have a JDA for disputed resources between Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei. Would that have reduced the amount of hydrocarbons that could be claimed by Sabah and Sarawak?

Malaysia – An engineer’s take on oil subsidies

Since oil subsidies have been a staple ingredient in the media, I thought I would list down some items of discussion with respect to either maintaining or dismantling the current subsidy structure:

• Subsidies stifle efficiency: With low consumer energy prices, industry might not be willing to develop more efficient technologies that increase efficiency, as there is no financial incentive to do so. Examples of such technologies are inverters to smooth out the start-stop power requirement of equipment such as air conditioners, more efficient lighting technology.
• Subsidies artificially increase commercial efficiency: If the viability of new manufacturing lines or engineering solutions have a energy cost component, then because energy is cheap, the return on investment would be higher than if energy was factored in at global prices.
• Malaysian pays for neighbours’ gas: ‘Nuff said.

Idea, meet money – Start a local Dragons’ Den?

It was brought to my attention yesterday that the BBC has an ongoing reality show called the Dragons’ Den. It’s a series where entrepreneurs pitch their ideas to secure investment finance from the Dragons — five elite business experts who are ready to pitch-in with their own money.

How about the Malaysian government, via the Ministry of Entrepreneurial and Cooperative Development (MeCD), start a television program with the same idea? To gather a larger crowd, some of the segments can be recorded in front of a live audience, to build up an initial critical mass of viewers. It’s not the same financial league as other game shows, but I would suggest that the number of successful ideas turned into SMIs is more important than having a smaller amount of winners with larger investments in each.

Aramco Recruitment Drive – 13th March, 2008.

Those of you who are thinking of finding out your worth in the Middle East may probably want to make your way to the Ritz Carlton between the 13th to 16th March, 2008. A little bird said to bring updated resumes and relevant certificates.

This announcement used to be on Aramco’s job opportunities webpage, but is no longer listed. I don’t know whether the event has been cancelled.

A call to the Ritz-Carlton reveals that Aramco has been having walk-in sessions every Wednesday and Friday, so I don’t know the significance of the 13th.

Professional Engineer – Competancy Exam Requirement

Engineers keeping up with the news would know that in addition to the Professional Assessment Examination (PAE), from January 1st, 2008 engineers would be required to pass a Competency Exam before being registered as a professional engineer in Malaysia.

Lo and behold, the date has slipped. Engineers who apply to take the CAE after April 1, 2008 would have to pass the CE.

The CE is intended to test the engineer’s knowledge with respect to laws applicable to their engineering speciality.

Kelantan: New Budget?

Malaysia will undergo its 12th election this March 8, 2008. The state of Kelantan is the only state whose administration is led by a non-member party of Barisan National, the ruling coalition.

To quote an article from today’s Sunday Star, ’Kelantan … (currently) gets an annual allocation of RM400mil (from the Federal government).’

Continuing the article, ‘state Barisan chairman … said the Prime Minister had already promised Kelantan a special allocation and an expanded budget of RM1bil annually.’ I’ll assume that this means that the state will get an expanded budget if Barisan National wins a majority in the state elections.

Would that mean that Kelantan has been under-budgeted all this time?