Egypt to hold three int'l tenders for oil, gas exploration in 2023
Petroleum and Mineral Resources Minister Tarek El-Molla said on Sunday that four international tenders in the excavation domain were launched through "Egypt Upstream Gateway" in 2022 and three other ones will be floated this year.
The petroleum sector achieved many successes in 2022, El-Molla said, citing the increase of petroleum exports to $18.2 billion and achieving a surplus in the petroleum balance of trade for the third consecutive year amounting to $3 billion.
El-Molla’s remarks came on Sunday during the inauguration of the 6th Egypt Petroleum Show (EGYPS 2023), which is held from 13 to 15 February at the Egypt International Exhibitions Center (EIEC) in Cairo, in the presence of President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi.
As part of Egypt's role as an energy hub, the petroleum sector succeeded over the past eight years in developing infrastructure through increasing the number of ports and platforms to receive butane gas carriers and adding 79 depots for crude oil and petroleum products storage.
Egypt has seen an unprecedented leap in its natural gas export revenues, which have increased 13-fold over the past eight years, according to a report issued in September by the Cabinet’s Information and Decision Support Centre (IDSC).
Egypt’s natural gas and liquified natural gas (LNG) export revenues reached $8 billion in the fiscal year 2021/2022, up from $0.6 billion in 2013/2014, according to the report.
Egypt has quadrupled its exports of LNG and natural gas over the past eight years from 1.9 million tons to 7.2 million tons.
In the same period, Egypt signed 108 agreements with international companies for the excavation of gas and petrol with a minimum investment value of $22 billion.
Egypt’s production reached 69.2 billion cubic metres (bcm) in 2021/2022 compared to 41.6 bcm in 2015/2016, a growth rate of 66.3 percent, the report read.
El-Molla said an ambitious plan was drafted with international partners to dig more than 300 new exploratory wells.
In the refining domain, eight new projects were carried out, three of which were inaugurated by President El-Sisi, El-Molla said.
Egypt also has the infrastructure for transporting and handling natural gas with a network of 7,000 km in pipelines, a distribution network of 31,000 km, and 29 gas-treatment plants as well as two LNG facilities – the Idku and Damietta plants.
Since achieving self-sufficiency in natural gas in 2018, Egypt has planned on using its position on Europe’s doorstep to become a major supplier of LNG to the continent – which is transitioning away from other fossil fuels – based on recent huge gas discoveries and production.