Chevron Corp

Chevron Corp. agreed to convert its oilfield-operating contracts in Venezuela to joint ventures with state-owned Petroleos de Venezuela. A transitional agreement will be signed Monday, San Ramon-Calif.-based Chevron said. Venezuela has now reached such agreements covering 28 of the 32 fields operated by third parties.

The chief executives of Chevron Corp.'s and Transocean Ltd.'s Brazilian units are among 17 executives at the two companies banned from leaving the country pending an investigation into an offshore oil spill. Chevron's George Buck and Transocean's Michael Legrand were on the list of managers that federal prosecutors asked Judge Vlamir Costa Magalhaes to ban from leaving Brazil, according to a copy of the request sent Monday by the prosecutor's office. The judge issued the ban Friday.

Chevron to Hunt Oil in South Caspian Sea: Chevron Overseas Exploration Ltd., a subsidiary of San Francisco-based Chevron Corp., said it has agreed with the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Republic, or SOCAR, to evaluate the area's potential. Chevron will also aid in transferring advanced technology to the former Soviet republic.

Chevron Corp. on Monday will unveil a solar oil field project that has been hit by cost overruns and delays but serves as a showcase for the technology of Chevron-backed solar thermal company BrightSource Energy. Chevron, the second-largest U.S. oil company, said Friday that three of its executives would attend the launch of the "demonstration project" in Coalinga, which is designed to use solar power to create steam to inject into wells to improve the flow of heavy oil. The 65-acre project consists of 7,600 mirrors focusing sunlight on a 327-foot tower.

Chevron Corp. said it would work with Petroleo Brasileiro on a $2.4-billion project to pump oil from the Frade offshore field in Brazil. Chevron will operate the project, which will be one of the first major foreign-operated oil fields in Brazil in half a century. Frade is scheduled to begin output by late 2008 or early 2009, the San Ramon, Calif.-based company said.

Chevron Corp. said it would raise capital spending 15% next year to $22.9 billion, making its most costly push ever to lift output after crude prices climbed near $100 a barrel. The spending plan includes an estimated $17.5 billion for oil and natural gas production and $4.1 billion for refining, San Ramon, Calif.-based Chevron said.

Chevron Corp. continued what has been a very big week for most of the world's super-sized oil companies, shattering analyst expectations and tripling its second-quarter profit to $5.4 billion compared with a year earlier. The industry's pumped-up profit provides a fresh target for public anguish over the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, which has fouled beaches in five states since the deadly April 20 explosion of a rig drilling a well for London oil giant BP. "They are thriving when a lot of families are out there suffering," said Tyson Slocum, director of Public Citizen's energy program.

In one of Hollywood's most gripping legal thrillers, Chevron Corp. is trying to obtain 600 hours of outtakes from a documentary film focused on oil industry environmental practices in Ecuador, sparking a court battle that has attracted the attention of 1st Amendment lawyers, top filmmakers, show business unions and a corporation that says it was defamed in another nonfiction film. For 17 years, the San Ramon, Calif.-based energy giant has fought a class-action lawsuit in Ecuador that could cost it up to $27 billion in damages and cleanup costs.

Chevron Corp. reported its largest profit increase in at least a decade, exceeding analyst estimates, after recovering economies around the world increased fuel demand. First-quarter net income more than doubled to $4.55 billion, or $2.27 a share, from $1.84 billion, or 92 cents, a year earlier, San Ramon, Calif.-based Chevron said Friday. Excluding severance costs, per-share profit was about $2.38, 43 cents higher than the average analyst estimate compiled by Bloomberg. Chevron Chief Executive John Watson boosted oil and natural-gas output by 4.5% with new wells from the Gulf of Mexico to Australia.

On a dirt plot near Bakersfield where a massive refinery once churned out gasoline and asphalt, one of the world's largest oil companies is looking for something more green. On Monday, Chevron Corp. plans to reveal that it has transformed the 8-acre site into a sprawling test facility with 7,700 solar panels. The panels, in various sizes, represent seven cutting-edge photovoltaic technologies from seven companies that Chevron is checking out as possible candidates to power its operations worldwide.

Chevron Corp. said Tuesday that it would cut 12% of its workforce and sell some overseas operations as it retrenches to stem the red ink in its struggling refining, marketing and transportation operations. The San Ramon, Calif., company said that 2,000 employees would be eliminated out of 17,000 workers in the so-called downstream part of its business. Executives of the second-largest U.S. oil company said they were still evaluating where the layoffs would be made. Chevron spokesman Lloyd Avram said Chevron planned to have the restructuring completed by the third quarter.

Chevron Corp., the nation's No. 2 oil company, said Friday that its fourth-quarter net income fell by more than a third compared with a year earlier. The decline was driven almost entirely by a huge reversal in the company's downstream segment, including its refineries, which swung from a fourth-quarter profit of more than $2 billion in 2008to a loss of more than $600 million in 2009. If not for the refining, marketing and transportation segment, Chevron would have posted a gain in net income of about $800 million compared with the same quarter in 2008.

Chevron Corp. expects its third-quarter earnings to be significantly higher than earnings from the second quarter on higher crude oil prices and gains from asset sales and tax items. Chevron said it expected about $400 million in gains related to asset sales and tax items. The San Ramon, Calif., firm also said results from its downstream businesses, such as refining and marketing, are expected to be relatively flat.