The suppliers were chosen after a tender award. The tender covers 2,500 km of large-diameter pipes with a total weight of roughly 2.2mn metric tons. In an announcement on March 11, the consortium said that it had chosen three firms for the supply: Germany-based Europipe for 40% of the required steel pipes; Russia's United Metallurgical Company (OMK) for 33%; and Russian firm Chelyabinsk Pipe-Rolling Plant (Chelpipe) for the remaining 27%.

U.S. companies are welcome to invest in Iran's oil and gas industry, the Iranian oil minister said.

This is American energy security, American jobs, U.S. government revenue and American GDP tied up by political red tape. This is a once in a generation opportunity, stuck, off limits to future generations as it waits for forward-looking energy policy.

Additional regulations on methane by the administration could discourage the shale energy revolution that has helped America lead the world in reducing emissions while significantly lowering the costs of energy to consumers. The administration is catering to environmental extremists at the expense of American consumers.

U.S. Rig Count is down 9 rigs from last week to 480, with oil rigs down 6 to 386, and gas rigs down 3 to 94. Canadian Rig Count is down 31 rigs from last week to 98, with oil rigs down 22 to 28, and gas rigs down 9 to 70.

“We need contracts, tenders and technology,” he said, describing Iran as a “garden” in need of nourishment. “Money for the Iranian economy is like water.”

Government said on Thursday it hoped to unlock gas and oil resources worth almost $40 billion by simplifying licensing rules and offering price incentives to recover gas from difficult offshore fields.

The data was revealed with the release of the Government Expenditure & Revenue Scotland (GERS) on March 9. According to that data, North Sea oil and gas revenue fell by 55% between the fiscal years 2013-2014 and 2014-2015. The revenue for 2014-2015 was just £2.25bn, less than half of the £4.8bn recorded in 2013-2014, and less than a quarter of the £10.9bn recorded in 2011-12.

The International Energy Agency estimates that over $25 trillion of investment will be needed in oil and gas supply alone from 2015 to 2040. So the long-term investment case for oil and gas remains strong, despite the fall in oil prices over the last 18 months. The concern is that prices seen in late 2015 and early 2016 may be too low to spur investment in projects that are needed to ensure long-term supplies. Without sufficient investment, the risk of demand exceeding supply will increase.

At low oil prices, customer choice rather than strategic Russian decision-making would allow Russia to retain over 30% of the roughly 490bn m³/yr European market and threaten US LNG export volumes.