Egypt Gas Turns The Corner, But Can It Maintain Investment?

...rek El Molla was keen to highlight the success of Italian firm Eni and the UK’s BP which have together brought on 2.5bn cfd of gas over the last 19 months, 45% of current 5.5bn cfd gas output. “Between November 2013 and December 2017, the country signed 83 E&P agreements, with minimum investments of...

India Makes Splash Offshore Abu Dhabi With First Post-Adma Contract

...on its expiry after 8 March (MEES, 17 November 2017). Current partners are Adnoc (60%), BP (14.66%), Total (13.34%) and Jodco, a subsidiary of Japan’s Inpex (12%). The award came during the visit of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and marks India’s entry into the Abu Dhabi upstream. Indian st...

Abu Dhabi Gets Small Producer Boost

...ported 91,000 b/d of Qatar Marine in 2017, more than half the total, and 21,000 b/d of Mubarraz crude.  Meanwhile, Adnoc said on 12 February that Al-Dhafra Petroleum will start production of around 20,000 b/d in 2019, ramping up to 20,000 b/d by 2020 and potentially “beyond 40,000 b/d barrels per day by...

Aramco, Total Firming Plan For Satorp Refining/ Petchems Integration

...State petroleum firm Saudi Aramco and France’s Total are firming up their plans for an expansion of their Satorp joint venture refinery and integration of the plant with a petrochemicals complex. Total chief executive Patrick Pouyanné told his firm’s 2017 earnings call on 8 February that th...

Total Deepens Algeria Ties

...gned a deal ending legal action brought by the French firm against Sonatrach in 2016 for changes made 10 years earlier to profit-sharing terms on its oil and gas contracts in the country (MEES, 21 April 2017). April’s Total-Sonatrach deal not only allowed the partners to “amicably” resolve the di...

Iraq Reboots Downstream Development Drive

...e Korean contractors led by Hyundai E&C working at Karbala under the $6bn EPC contract awarded in 2014. CUTTING IMPORTS ESSENTIAL Iraq’s modest progress in rehabilitating refineries enabled it to boost refining runs to around 535,000 b/d in 2017 – the highest since 2013 when Baiji was still op...

UAE Nuclear Plans: More Delays Likely

...schedule. A Kepco executive said at the time that “it’s very difficult for us to predict the possible compensation that may be involved and our future plans for our manpower dispatched to the project” (MEES, 12 May 2017). Kepco has not issued an update on the situation since. FANR’s op...

Dewa Awards Gas-Fired Power Project

...tensive LNG export commitments – around 90% goes to Japan, which took 4.68mn tons in 2017 down from 4.99mn t in 2016 and a record 5.70mn t in 2014 (see chart, MEES, 16 February). This means that the UAE only achieves gas balance by importing 1.7bn cfd via the Dolphin pipeline from Qatar to Abu Dhabi as...

Russia, Saudi Arabia Commit To Enforcing Production Discipline

...rtainly be “extraordinary.” US crude and condensate production grew 467,000 b/d in 2017, but the latest production forecasts from the US government’s EIA are for a massive 1.27mn b/d increase this year. That’s still 120,000 b/d shy of the IEA’s expected global demand growth. But then the EIA also predicts an...

Eni Cyprus Discovery: ‘Good-Good-Good, Or Just Good’?

...ck to Zohr 80km to the southeast (see map, MEES 16 February). Zohr, the Mediterranean’s largest ever gas find, started up in December 2017; current output is 400mn cfd. Phase-2, slated to raise output to 2.9bn cfd next year, is intentionally being developed with sufficient spare capacity to allow th...

Mauritania: Tortue Deal

...come from just two wells and one 2.3mn t/y FPSO. Ongoing cashflow will then pay for subsequent development – a second 2.3mn t/y FPSO is slated to be added in 2023 (MEES, 10 November 2017), with the potential for additional identikit expansion. The good news on Tortue development comes after an an...

Will 2018 Be A Boon Year For Middle Eastern IPOs?

...aged a healthy comeback in 2017. The planned listing of Saudi state-energy giant Aramco has dominated discussions on the outlook for regional IPOs in 2018. But even if this is delayed into 2019, this year looks to have a healthy pipeline, with the UAE and Egypt to the fore. The value of Middle Ea...

Egypt Raises $4bn Bond

...Egypt has raised $4bn from a Eurobond, the Finance Ministry announced on 14 February. The bond, three times oversubscribed, had been in the pipeline since October (MEES, 20 October 2017). The issue consists of three tranches: $1.25bn of five-year paper with a yield of 5.58%; $1.25bn of 10...

Iraq Reconstruction Donors Pledge $30bn

...$5bn, could prove toxic with Mr Abadi’s Shia base given Ankara’s support for Kurdish and Sunni political groups. WAR SCARS REVEALED             Mr Abadi claimed in early 2017 that Islamic State damage totaled $35bn (MEES, 10 March 2017), but the destructive operation to liberate Mosul and th...

Spain 2017 Crude Imports ('000 B/D): Strong Iran And Libya Recovery Raises Mideast Volumes To 6-Year High

The Top 5 Global LNG Importers, All In Asia, Took A Record 195Mn T In 2017, Up 11% On 2016’s Previous Record, As China Overtook Korea As #2 Importer (Mn T)

...*ESTIMATES FOR TAIWAN AND INDIA BASED ON JAN-NOV AND JAN-OCT 2017 DATA. SOURCE: NATIONAL IMPORT STATISTICS, IGU, GIIGNL....