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GCC Eyes 2022 As Year Of Stability
...is year saw Saudi Arabia host two GCC summits. The 41st summit was held in Al Ula in January and marked the end of the Qatar embargo, which had been in force since June 2017 and had defined the GCC ever since (MEES, 8 January). If that January summit was high profile, the 42nd iteration in Riyadh on...
Volume: 64Issue: 51/52Published at Fri, 24 Dec 2021 -
Vienna Talks: Iran Holds Its Ground
...y 2017). But despite the major economic pressure the country is under (MEES, 25 June), Tehran is showing little in the way of urgency for an agreement to be reached. The negotiations last week ended in a deadlock after Tehran’s 40-strong team led by chief negotiator Ali Bagheri Kani submitted tw...
Volume: 64Issue: 49Published at Fri, 10 Dec 2021 -
Petrofac Hopes To Turn Page After UK Bribery Conviction
...UK-based services firm Petrofac is hoping to put a scandal-riven few years behind it after a UK court on 4 October found it guilty on seven counts of bribery involving payments of $44mn to secure $3.5bn of contracts in Gulf countries between 2011 and 2017. In a case brought by the UK’s Se...
Volume: 64Issue: 40Published at Fri, 08 Oct 2021 -
Iran Hopes To Develop Iraq Border Fields, Finances & Technology Stand In The Way
...er to the new administration was development of the Azar field. Production began at 30,000 b/d in 2017 and had hit 65,000 b/d and 71.5mn cfd by the end of the 2020-21 Iranian year. On the Iraqi side of the border, the field is operated by Russia’s Gazprom Neft and is known as Badra. The ne...
Volume: 64Issue: 39Published at Fri, 01 Oct 2021 -
Iran Halts Power Exports To Iraq As Baghdad Struggles To Curb Attacks On Pylons
...66bn cfd earlier this year, flows now stand at just 800mn cfd, of which around 700mn cfd is to central Iraq and the remainder to Basra. Even at 1.66bn cfd, flows were well down on the 2.47bn cfd contractual obligation. Iran-Iraq gas flows averaged 1bn cfd for 2020. Flows started in 2017 with the op...
Volume: 64Issue: 33Published at Fri, 20 Aug 2021 -
Iraqi Parliament Seeks To Block NOC Appointments
...iticized the 2017 creation of Dhi Qar Oil Company (DQOC) . CAN INOC DELIVER? With Exxon heading to the exit, Baghdad may sooner or later have to step in and operate the 470,000 b/d WQ-1 field. But whether it has the capacity to manage this on top of the other fields, such as 250,000 b/d Majnoon, is an...
Volume: 64Issue: 28Published at Fri, 16 Jul 2021 -
Sparks Fly As Saudi-Emirati Economic Competition Intensifies
...aditionally held a clear dominance. In the UAE, Abu Dhabi’s Adnoc is planning to invest $122bn over 2021-2025, much of which is dedicated to expanding its crude oil production capacity from around 4mn b/d to 5mn b/d by 2030. Just five years ago, before the first Opec+ cuts came into force in 2017, the UAE wa...
Volume: 64Issue: 27Published at Fri, 09 Jul 2021 -
Gulfsands Bullish On Syria Return As Key Russian Investor Consolidates Position
...nserving cash for potential Syria re-entry. Whilst Gulfsands says it has had no control over and received no revenue from its Syria assets since 2011, it was informed by Syrian state firm GPC that the Block 26 fields, having produced intermittently since 2014, “returned to regular production in January 2017...
Volume: 64Issue: 23Published at Fri, 11 Jun 2021 -
Another One Bites The Dust: Shell To Quit Tunisian Upstream
...bruary 2017), nor did state-power firm Steg’s chronic inability to pay Shell for gas produced. As of end-2018 debt-ridden Steg owed Shell some $230mn. With the current dire state of the country’s finances (see p10), it is unlikely matters have improved since. Shell has previously tried and failed to se...
Volume: 64Issue: 18Published at Fri, 07 May 2021 -
Sunny Hill: No More Eggs, No More Basket
...layed – it was previously slated for 2017 start-up (MEES, 21 July 2017) – it was thought that Petrofac’s EPC contract had been progressing relatively smoothly, albeit with some potential pandemic-related delays. That Sonatrach is pursuing start-up just two months after the date of the original 48-month co...
Volume: 64Issue: 15Published at Fri, 16 Apr 2021 -
Marib Conflict Threatens Yemen’s Struggling Oil Sector
...llapsed to just 14,000 b/d in 2016. Green shoots then began to emerge, first in the eastern Masila Basin where state firm PetroMasila restarted oil production in 2016 (MEES, 15 September 2017). PetroMasila produces 40,000-50,000 b/d from Blocks 10 & 14, of which some 34,000 b/d was exported last year. Oi...
Volume: 64Issue: 12Published at Fri, 26 Mar 2021 -
Ex-Sonatrach CEO Held In Dubai Amid Refinery Probe
...rest warrant “against the main accused” in the ongoing corruption case surrounding Sonatrach’s December 2018 purchase of Italy’s 200,000 b/d Augusta refinery (MEES, 11 May 2018). “The main accused” was widely believed to be Ould Kaddour, who was Sonatrach CEO from 3 April 2017 to 23 April 2019 and le...
Volume: 64Issue: 12Published at Fri, 26 Mar 2021 -
Houthis Step Up Siege On Aramco Energy Infrastructure
...rt of a regional tour, during which he met with Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan. During the talks, Prince Faisal said that Riyadh will take “necessary deterrent measures to protect its national resources,” hinting that the kingdom could pursue its plans from 2017 to purchase Russian S-...
Volume: 64Issue: 10Published at Fri, 12 Mar 2021 -
Repsol & Shell Leave Morocco; Repsol Quits Iraqi Kurdistan
...as Covid hit) fuel Morocco’s two gas-fired power plants (MEES, 5 June 2020). The exit of Repsol and Shell leaves the only sizable players in Morocco as Eni, which has the shallow water Tarfaya permit off the south of the country (MEES, 22 December 2017), and ConocoPhillips which signed up for th...
Volume: 64Issue: 09Published at Fri, 05 Mar 2021 -
Egypt-Palestine-Qatar
...om Egypt and Qatar this week meeting in Kuwait to discuss the normalization of bilateral relations. Egypt in 2017 joined Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain in breaking off relations with Qatar. The three Gulf countries last month agreed to end the embargo and reestablish relations (MEES, 8 January). ...
Volume: 64Issue: 08Published at Fri, 26 Feb 2021 -
Iraq Struggles To Find Developers For Mansuriya Gas Field
...erating on a feedstock of diesel and heavy fuel oil. Iraq’s notorious practice of fuel switching due to gas shortages reduces efficiency and increases maintenance requirements (MEES, 12 February). In 2017, GE restored 90% of the power station’s generation capacity after large parts of the site had be...
Volume: 64Issue: 07Published at Fri, 19 Feb 2021 -
Libya’s Power Sector In A Race Against Time
...ka said last month it was “about to start construction” on two gas turbine power plants – 650MW Misrata and 690MW Tripoli West – worth a combined 1.3GW (MEES, 8 January). Enka’s partner on the projects, Siemens, will provide the turbines. At the time of the original award in 2017, Siemens costed th...
Volume: 64Issue: 05Published at Fri, 05 Feb 2021 -
Long-Running Qatar Embargo Ends With GCC Summit Agreement
...Three and a half years after it began, the embargo of Qatar is over as Saudi Arabia and its allies agreed to restore ties. The decision appears based on pragmatic economic calculations, with Saudi Arabia keen to attract foreign investment. But the scars from 2017’s actions mean that full re...
Volume: 64Issue: 01Published at Fri, 08 Jan 2021