ConocoPhillips is set to sign a deal with Syria’s state gas company this week for the development of local fields, the Financial Times reported, citing unnamed sources as saying the deal could be signed as early as this week.
Per the report, Conoco will partner with a company named Novaterra Energy that describes itself as an entity set up “to restore and transform Syria’s domestic gas production to meet its growing power needs.”
The two will develop both existing fields and explore for new production, the sources told the Financial Times. The development follows the signing of a preliminary deal between Conoco and the Syrian government last year. At the time, the government said it expected the deal to boost the country’s gas output by some 4 to 5 million cu m daily. Before the civil war broke out in 2011, Syria was producing 30 million cu m of gas daily.
“It’s a pivotal moment, it’s good the companies are going into Syria, once you have a contract you can try and move, let’s see how fast they can go,” a former advisor on Syria to the first Trump administration told the Financial Times. “The administration has been talking about sanctions relief, companies are hoping to get in on the ground floor,” Andrew Tabler also said.
Earlier this year, Wood Mackenzie said that Syria holds remaining discovered oil and gas resources of at least 1.3 billion barrels of oil equivalent, with large areas of the country still underexplored. Syria’s offshore sector remains entirely untapped, with no exploration wells drilled to date.
As the Syrian government recently regained control over key oil and gas fields in the Deir ez-Zor and Al-Raqqah provinces, domestic production is set to rebound this year, Wood Mackenzie said in January.
Based on agreements signed with the Syrian government in recent months, these resources will be developed by companies including not just ConocoPhillips but Chevron, TotalEnergies, Eni, and QatarEnergy.
By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com
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