Staying with Woodside, its boss John Akehurst was in Sydney this week trying to dampen media and investor criticism over the company's short to mid-term strategy. However, not everybody is critical with the company. DJ Carmichael and Deutsche Bank recommend investors take a good look at Woodside.

Junior explorer Norwest Energy was busy raising cash for its upcoming Perth Basin drilling program while energy and e-commerce player CityView is hoping to get its cash from Sands Solution after a receiver was appointed for the IT outfit and Burswood neighbour.

A big payout to a former shareholder marred what otherwise was a positive profit for refiner and petrol station owner Caltex Australia.

Kimberley Oil and Kalrez Energy were busy engaging in a boardroom shuffle. In Kalrez's case, the boardroom shuffle indicates a bit of power shift at the company as trading was halted on the ASX. The new directors don't like what they found, according to last night's ASX release.

In the field, Woodside kept up its Gulf of Mexico drilling after kicking off a new appraisal well and plugging and abandoning another wildcat in the region.

Mosaic Oil, in its unusual role of leading the drilling for its larger partner Santos, spudded the Churchie-1A well using its underbalanced, nitrogen drilling approach.

Meanwhile, delays in the arrival of a drilling rig have put back the spud date for the Koroit-1 well in Victoria to early January.

Overseas, continuing turmoil in Venezuela, which is world's fifth largest oil producer, pushed the price of oil up to $US27 barrel. Also making traders nervous was renewed Iraqi defiance over weapons of mass destruction, which increases the likelihood of a US-led attack on Iraq thus disrupting supplies.

In the US, vice president Dick Cheney scored a big win during the week after a US court found the investigative arm of Congress has no right to sue him over failing to disclose documents relating to his formulation of energy policy, which critics argued favoured 'Big Oil'.

ExxonMobil and Spain are paying dearly for oil spills. In Exxon's case, its damages in relation to the Exxon Valdez disaster in 1989 in Alaska were reduced, however it still has to pay $US4 billion. As for Spain, the punters there are in uproar over news of continuing leaks from the sunken oil tanker Prestige.

ChevronTexaco approved plans for an offshore LNG terminal in the Gulf of Mexico while ConocoPhillips approved plans to spend billions on exploration, refining, marketing and emerging businesses.