KUALA LUMPUR: PETROLIAM Nasional Bhd (Petronas) is considering divesting some “not so good” assets in the near future.
President and chief executive officer (CEO) Datuk Wan Zulkiflee Wan Ariffin said the company would make the divestment at the right time.
“Although the assets may not be very big, when the right time comes and if we see any opportunity, we will do it,” he said at the CEO strategic dialogue session during the 19th Asia Oil and Gas Conference, here, yesterday.
He said Petronas had successfully divested its assets in Africa.
Wan Zulkiflee said Petronas had been keeping its capital expenditure consistent throughout the years at between RM50 billion and RM60 billion annually, at 50:50 ratio for upstream and downstream.
He also said in the next 20 years, oil and gas would remain Petronas’s core business but there was opportunity in renewable energy.
“I would not discount, after having done enough assessment and identifying the opportunity, we will also have a serious look and maybe acquire other forms of renewable energy for investment.” Wan Zulkiflee also said cost management and efficiency would be a standard practice for the company regardless of the oil price levels.
Brent crude futures traded at US$49.82 (RM216) per barrel, up US$0.72, or 1.47 per cent, yesterday.
He said since the inception of Cost Reduction Alliance 2.0 (Coral 2.0) in 2015, the company had been able to save around RM5 billion.
He said inefficiency must not return to the system.
Wan Zulkiflee said although Petronas was seen to have done more cost-cutting in the upstream sector, it was also doing the same for the downstream sector.
“We have been focusing on upstream because this involves a lot of collaboration with our production sharing contract partners. We do have programmes for downstream but it may not be as widely publicised as Coral 2.0,” he added.