Egypt to Retain Natural Gas Reserves, Change Export Policy

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--The Egyptian cabinet's information and decision support center conducted a study that showed that Egypt relies 94.5% on fossil fuel (oil and gas) to produce its energy needs. Natural gas has provided about 55% of Egypt's energy requirements for the past three years. Following the Egyptian revolution, the Egyptian petroleum sector is now auditing gas exports and has adopted a plan to cope with 7% growth in local demand for fossil energy resources.

To develop and increase its domestic supplies of natural gas, the study recommended the following list of actions:

• Revise the exported stock of liquefied gas with respect to its amount and price.
• Review of contracts that deal with gas production shares between foreign partners and Egyptian nationals.
• Develop and encourage the efforts of research and exploration in the fields of oil and gas.
• Cancel the extension plan of the Arab gas line extension stage to Syria.
• Present a stimulus package for foreign partners who have to carry out export commitments to secure gas supplies for local market.

According to this plan, the Egyptian petroleum sector decided to review all natural gas export contracts to neighboring countries such as Jordan, Syria, Israel and Lebanon, and review the selling price and cooperate with international companies for exploring gas fields and enlarging the national gas reserve.

This week, Dana Gas, the regional private sector company in the Middle East, working in the field of natural gas, announced its latest discoveries of natural gas in the Nile Delta in Egypt . The company has a new discovery in the field at 4.8 meters depth in the middle layer. Tests showed the well has the potential of producing 14.1 million cubic feet of gas and 718 barrels per day of condensates, in addition to 5.9 million cubic feet of dry gas. The volume of proven reserves for the new discovery has been estimated in a range between 50 to 90 billion cubic feet of gas, and between 1 million and 2 million barrels of condensates.

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