Saudi Arabia and Kuwait have announced a new oil discovery in the so-called Partitioned Zone (PZ) between the two OPEC heavyweights which share equally output from the area.
Saudi Arabia and Kuwait announced on Monday that Wafra Joint Operations had made a new oil discovery in the North Wafra Wara-Burgan field, located 5 kilometers (3.1 miles) north of the Wafra field, the official Saudi Press Agency reported.
The so-called Partitioned Neutral Zone (PNZ) was established between Saudi Arabia and Kuwait in 1922 to settle a territorial dispute, while crude oil was first discovered at Wafra in the 1950s.
Now the Wara reservoir in the North Wafra (Wara-Burgan-1) well flowed at a rate exceeding 500 barrels per day of crude oil with an API gravity of 26 to 27 degrees, the Saudi agency reported.
“This marks the first discovery since the resumption of production operations in the Partitioned Zone and its adjacent offshore area in mid-2020,” Saudi Arabia said.
“The discovery is regarded as highly significant, given its positive impact on both countries’ standing as reliable global energy suppliers and their capabilities in the exploration and production sector.”
Saudi Arabia is currently leading OPEC+ efforts to return more oil supply to the market, as the top OPEC producer is fed up with overproduction from other OPEC+ members, most notably Kazakhstan, and appears willing to endure short-term price pain to discipline U.S. shale.
Kuwait, for its part, plans to invest as much as $50 billion to raise its oil production capacity to above 3 million barrels per day (bpd) over the next five years, Kuwait Petroleum Corporation’s deputy chairman and CEO, Shaikh Nawaf Al-Sabah, said earlier this month.
The 2040 strategy of Kuwait’s state-owned corporation envisages the OPEC producer to boost its sustainable crude oil production capacity to 4 million bpd, including capacity in the Partitioned Zone. Kuwait, a founding member of OPEC, is the cartel’s fifth-largest producer, behind Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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