Five major oil companies will jointly construct a $2.3 billion refinery in Argentina, the country’s government announced recently, Latin America News Digest reported.

Spain’s Repsol-YPF, Brazil’s state Petrobras, Argentina’s Pan American Energy, Chevron and ExxonMobil’s Argentine subsidiary will team up on the refinery.

Brazil’s motor vehicle sales in 2006 jumped 12.4%, to more than 1.9 million vehicles, last year, the Brazilian Motor Vehicle Manufacturers Association (Anfavea) said.

State oil company Petroecuador plans to spend $6 billion in the next five years to build a new refinery and improve its current refineries, Marketwatch reported.

The company would use revenues from the oil fields it took over from Occidental Petroleum earlier this year to fund the projects, the report said.

Colombia’s state oil company Ecopetrol has received a grant from the U.S. Trade & Development Administration for a U.S. company to develop a feasibility study for a modernization of the country’s Barrancabermeja refinery, the agency said.

The study will be aimed at developing a plan that addresses hydrocracking, fuel oil conversion, modernization of the refinery’s existing solvent deasphalting unit and the feasibility of installing a vacuum bottom delayed coker plant.

Chevron announced recently it has completed an expansion of a fluid catalytic cracking unit at its 330,000 b/d refinery in Pascagoula, Miss.

The expansion increases the refinery’s gasoline manufacturing capacity by about 10%, to 5.5 million gallons per day.

Venezuela’s state oil company PDVSA is looking at constructing a new refinery in Argentina, Latin America News Digest reported.

Kinder Morgan announced recently that its stockholders have voted to approve the company’s acquistion by an investor group led by chairman and CEO Richard Kinder.

About 75% of the shares of stock voted in a special meeting and 97% of them voted in favor of the sale, representing 73% of the total shares. The sale needed the approval of two-thirds of shares to go through.

China’s state oil company Sinopec has started up a 1.5 million ton per year hydrogenation and cracking unit at its refinery in Zhenhai, mainland China’s largest, China Petrochemical News reported.

State oil company PetroChina announced that it has broken ground on a new refinery in Qinzhou in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in Southwest China.

The refinery will have a capacity of 10 million tons per year, although it is expected to produce 7.6 million tons per year of refined products at start-up, the company said.

Thai Oil, Thailand’s top oil refiner, said recently it plans to finish a 50,000 b/d expansion of its refining capacity by the fourth quarter of next year.

Japanese automaker Toyota said recently it expects to produce 9.4 million vehicles worldwide in 2007, increasing the likelihood that it will pass General Motors to become the world’s top-selling automaker.

Iran is planning several projects at its Abadan refinery, including a new 180,000 b/d refinery adjacent to the existing one, the country’s Oil Minister said, Islamic Republic News Agency reported.

Oil Minister Seyed Kazem Vaziri Hamaneh said the new refinery would definitely be constructed, but did not provide a timetable for it or any of the other projects, the report said. He said work would only begin after the necessary funding has been secured.

Japanese automaker Nissan is in talks with electronics company NEC regarding a possible joint venture to make lithium ion batteries for use in hybrid and fuel cell vehicles, the Associated Press reported.

The partnership would include developing, manufacturing and selling the batteries.

Russian oil company Lukoil’s Odessa refinery in Ukraine is set to restart in September 2007, rather than the original plan of 2008, Reuters reported, citing a Ukraine government official.

A test restart will be conducted next August and the refinery will be return to full capacity in September, the official said.

Slovakia’s anti-monopoly office announced recently in a posting on its website that it has fined refining company Slovnaft 300 million koruna ($11.5 million) for “abuse of a dominant position,” without giving further details.

Polish oil company PKN Orlen will invest $700-$900 million in its newly-acquired Mazeikiu Nafta refinery in Lithuanian, the company’s CEO said in an interview with a Polish radio station, Baltic Business Daily reported.

PKN finalized the purchase of the refinery for a total of $2.3 billion.

ConocoPhillips announced that it has started production of renewable diesel fuel at its Whitegate refinery in Cork, Ireland.