LONDON, July 24: The new boss of BP on Tuesday demanded vast improvement at the world’s third biggest oil group after reporting that energy output slid for an eighth straight quarter on US refinery woes.

“BP’s current operational performance is not good enough,” group chief executive Tony Hayward told a press conference after the British group said oil and gas output fell 5.3 per cent to 3.804 million barrels per day in the second quarter of 2007 compared with a year earlier.

Hayward took over in May after the dramatic resignation of chief executive John Browne. He brings great experience of BP’s output troubles, having stepped up from the role of head of exploration and production.

BP has yet to recover from the fallout of the fatal Texas City refinery explosion in 2005 which has raised doubts about safety across the group’s US facilities.

On Tuesday, BP also reported a drop in net profit during the second quarter.

Net profit on the basis of replacement costs, which excludes the effect of changes in the value of oil and gas inventories, fell by 0.5pc to $6.087bn in the three months to June 30, compared with the same period in 2006.—AFP