March 07, 2011, 4:41 AM EST
By Carli Lourens
March 7 (Bloomberg) -- Sasol Ltd., the world’s largest producer of motor fuels made from coal, boosted its first-half dividend 11 percent as oil price gains and cost control lifted profit.
The increase to 3.10 rand (45 U.S. cents) a share also takes into account “the improved market and economic conditions,” Johannesburg-based Sasol said in a statement today. Net profit jumped 21 percent to 7.6 billion rand in the six months through Dec. 31 from 6.3 billion rand a year earlier.
Sasol’s profit is closely tied to oil prices and to the South African currency exchange rate against the dollar. Oil gained 16 percent to $105.96 a barrel in New York so far this year while the rand weakened 3.8 percent to 6.88 on the dollar.
A proposed $8.8 billion coal-to-fuel project in China by Sasol and partner Shenhua Ningxia Coal Industry Group Ltd. was approved by the Chinese environmental ministry, according to a posting on the ministry’s website today. A feasibility study on a gas-to-fuel plant in Uzbekistan should be completed this month and an initial study into a coal-to-fuels plant in India is in its “final stages,” Sasol said today.
Costs will be contained within “inflationary levels” for the full year, the company said. Synthetic fuel output will be “marginally lower” in the full year after falling 7.5 percent in the first half as the South African coal-to-fuels plant underwent its biggest ever planned maintenance outage, it added.
The company uses proprietary Fischer-Tropsch technology to make gasoline, diesel and jet fuel from coal it mines in South Africa and from natural gas from below the ocean floor near Qatar. The company shifted the focus of future investment to gas last year, betting it will be a more profitable raw material than coal.
Tags : Shenhua Ningxia Coal Industry Group, Fischer - Tropsch technology
The increase to 3.10 rand (45 U.S. cents) a share also takes into account “the improved market and economic conditions,” Johannesburg-based Sasol said in a statement today. Net profit jumped 21 percent to 7.6 billion rand in the six months through Dec. 31 from 6.3 billion rand a year earlier.
Sasol’s profit is closely tied to oil prices and to the South African currency exchange rate against the dollar. Oil gained 16 percent to $105.96 a barrel in New York so far this year while the rand weakened 3.8 percent to 6.88 on the dollar.
A proposed $8.8 billion coal-to-fuel project in China by Sasol and partner Shenhua Ningxia Coal Industry Group Ltd. was approved by the Chinese environmental ministry, according to a posting on the ministry’s website today. A feasibility study on a gas-to-fuel plant in Uzbekistan should be completed this month and an initial study into a coal-to-fuels plant in India is in its “final stages,” Sasol said today.
Costs will be contained within “inflationary levels” for the full year, the company said. Synthetic fuel output will be “marginally lower” in the full year after falling 7.5 percent in the first half as the South African coal-to-fuels plant underwent its biggest ever planned maintenance outage, it added.
The company uses proprietary Fischer-Tropsch technology to make gasoline, diesel and jet fuel from coal it mines in South Africa and from natural gas from below the ocean floor near Qatar. The company shifted the focus of future investment to gas last year, betting it will be a more profitable raw material than coal.
Tags : Shenhua Ningxia Coal Industry Group, Fischer - Tropsch technology
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