Egypt’s Petroleum and Mineral Resources Minister Tareq El-Molla has said that Egypt was ready to meet more of the increased demand for natural gas in Europe as its LNG exports have increased to 8 million tonnes per annum in 2022 and the capacity is there for growth in 2023.
“Efforts exerted over the past years have made of Egypt one of the solutions to the ongoing energy problem,” said the Minister in a keynote speech to the eighth Egypt Oil and Gas Convention on November 27 in Cairo.
The convention is taking place at the Dusit Thani Lakeview Hotel in the Egyptian capital through November 29.
El-Molla noted that Egypt had the capacity to export up to 12 MTPA of LNG annually from the two plants located east of the Mediterranean city of Alexandria.
He said that out of the total of LNG cargo exports from the Idku LNG plant and the Damietta facility about 90 percent were delivered to Europe.
He noted that the successes of the petroleum sector in Egypt was due to the integrated strategy of partnerships between the public and private sectors and was fully supported by the government of President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi.
“The petroleum sector is also seeking mechanisms of action that would maximize cooperation with international partners to be able to make optimal use of our natural resources,” said the Minister.
The Minister said that the strategy rested on increasing and sustaining oil and natural gas production while also reducing carbon emissions.
Feed-gas boosted
Egypt is set to increase LNG supplies by almost 30 percent this year compared with the 6.1MT shipped in 2021 as feed-gas supplies have stabilised.
The Minister added that Egypt's revenues from the exports of LNG, petrochemicals and petroleum products would amount in 2022 to $19 billion.
He said that Egypt is working towards developing energy sources of all kinds simultaneously, be they traditional energy sources, especially natural gas, or renewable sources like solar energy and wind.
Egypt’s previous natural gas shortages were solved by Eni’s Zohr gas field discovery in the East Med and other gas finds in the nation’s extensive oil and gas basins leading to a re-start of the Damietta LNG plant in February 2021 after it had been idle since the end of 2012.
The Egyptian domestic natural gas market also receives pipeline gas from Israel.
The Damietta facility has as its shareholders the Italian energy company Eni as well as two of Egypt’s state-owned companies, Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (EGAS) and Egyptian General Petroleum Corp. (EGPC).
The facility has nameplate capacity of 5 MTPA and with Eni owning 50 percent of the plant while EGAS and EGPC hold 40 percent and 10 percent respectively.
The second Egyptian plant, the Idku facility, has 7.2 MTPA of capacity from two Trains and is operated by Shell.
