Libya will step up its natural gas production to be able to supply more of the commodity to Europe, the chairman of the national Oil Corporation said today, as quoted by Reuters.
Masoud Sulaiman said the country’s national oil company will aim to ramp up natural gas production to almost 1 billion cu ft daily and begin exploration in its shale deposits in the second half of the year, the Reuters report also said. Sulaiman did not elaborate on what volumes would be made available to European buyers.
Libya has natural gas reserves of an estimated 80 trillion cu ft, the top oil official also said, speaking at the LNG 2026 gathering in Qatar. Exports of the commodity, however, are rather modest at the moment. The exports are shipped to southern Italy via the Greenstream pipeline from Western Libya.
Last month, Libyan officials presented plans for attracting some $20 billion in fresh oil and gas investments, boosting crude oil production to 2 million barrels daily by 2030 and ramping up gas production as well. For this year, Libya will aim for gas production rates of an average of 700 to 750 million cubic feet daily.
In oil, “We witnessed the highest production rate in years, averaging 1.375 million bpd, which is a strong testimony to our recovery and stability,” the country’s oil minister, Dr. Khalifa Abdulsadek, said at the Libya Energy & Economic Summit. “We have launched a program with 15 companies, and we expect production to rise over the next five years with a $20 billion investment.”
Last year, Libya launched its first oil and gas exploration tender since 2007, which is also the first since the civil war erupted in the country in 2011 after the toppling of Muammar Gaddafi. Exxon, Chevron, TotalEnergies, and Eni were among the 37 international companies that expressed interest in Libyan acreage for oil and gas exploration at the tender.
By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com
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