Thursday, September 8, 2016

Carlyle's Stressed PES: Yergin to Rescue


The Carlyle Group's Philadelphia Energy Solutions is "significantly stressed" according to Bloomberg.

Company pension contributions will be frozen, healthcare benefits will be cut and buyouts will be offered to salaried employees,
Carlyle experienced regular explosions at the Philadelphia refinery, so one has to wonder how postponing maintenance will turn out.

Maintenance planned at the 335,000 barrels-a-day Philadelphia refinery will move to 2017.
BP's Lord John Browne pushed out maintenance and his Texas City refinery exploded in 2005 killing fifteen people.   Lord John partnered with Carlyle on energy via their Riverstone joint venture.  That collaboration ended in 2011.

Carlyle tapped another energy expert, according to today's news:

The Carlyle Group has named Dr. Daniel Yergin as a Senior Adviser. Yergin is the founder of the Cambridge Energy Research Associates, which is now part of IHS Markit. Also, he is a director of the Council on Foreign Relations and is the author of several best-selling books one of which “The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil Money and Power,” won the Pulitzer Prize.
It's not clear if any workers died under Dr. Yergin's leadership. I'll venture the PEU quest for energy money and power will take down many workers, directly or indirectly.  Pensions frozen, healthcare cut:  It spells pain at the bottom.  The greed and leverage boys.take care of themselves.

Update 10-3-16:  The stressed theme continues for Carlyle's PES