MUSCAT, DEC 26 - Central Oman, home to the recently discovered Mabrouk North East gas field, represents a new frontier for hydrocarbon exploration, according to the new Exploration Director of Petroleum Development Oman (PDO) Hisham al Siyabi said a number of new oil and gas discoveries have been made in this promising region of the Sultanate during 2018 — the specifics of which will be announced at the next annual briefing of the Ministry of Oil & Gas in March 2019.
Addressing the latest ‘MD/TD Talk’ hosted by PDO’s Managing Director and Technical Director for senior company executives, Al Siyabi described 2018 as “an exceptional year” during which members of his Exploration Directorate broke records “left, right and centre”.
His comments were published in the latest edition of PDO’s monthly newsletter Al Fahal. The publication quoted the Exploration Director as stating that the Mabrouk North East find, with estimated recoverable reserves of more than four trillion cubic feet (TCF), was the largest in
PDO since Saih Rawl in 1992 and potentially the largest in the world this year.
Mabrouk North East’s discovery was first made public in March this year during the Annual Media Briefing hosted by the Ministry. PDO Managing Director Raoul Restucci described the gas find as “significant”, with estimated recoverable reserves of around 4.4 TCF. Five wells drilled in the field all encountered gas, officials said at the time, noting that exploration is ongoing in nearby prospects.
Rystad Energy, an based independent energy research and business intelligence company, recently ranked the giant gas-condensate discovery as among the Top 10 largest Oil & Gas finds of 2018 globally. With estimated recoverable reserves of 671 million barrels of oil equivalent (Mmboe), Mabrouk North East was also billed as the largest onshore discovery during the first half of this year.
The Oslo-Norway based energy think-tank also placed the Sultanate fifth in its list of countries featuring the Top Global Conventional Discoveries of 2018. Oman came just behind Guyana, where Eni uncovered its Calpyso gas find offshore Cyprus with recoverable reserves of 672 Mmboe. Leading the rankings was Guyana where ExxonMobil registered its tenth discovery in the prolific Stabroek block (2071 Mmboe), followed by Russia (1336 Mmboe) and the United States (746 Mmboe).
Oman’s Ministry of Oil & Gas is currently pursuing talks with a number of energy giants on the development and monetisation of gas resources in the Greater Barik Area in Central Oman, which includes the latest Mabrouk discovery.
In May this year, Shell and Total signed MoUs with the Ministry to develop a cluster of gas discoveries located in the Greater Barik area in central Oman. Under a separate agreement reached between the two energy firms, Shell (also as operator with a 75 per cent share) and Total (25 per cent) have targeted an initial production of around 500 million standard cubic feet per day (MMcfd) with a potential to reach 1 billion cubic feet/day in the future.
Shell has committed to utilising part of this output in the development of a first-of-its-kind gas-to-liquids (GTL) project in the Sultanate. Total, for its part, aims to use its equity gas entitlement as feedstock to develop a regional hub for Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) bunkering service which will supply LNG as a fuel to marine vessels. A liquefaction plant initially of around 1 million tonnes-per-year capacity is proposed to be built and operated by Total at Sohar Port. Oman Oil Company is also expected to partner with Shell and Total in both the upstream and downstream investments.
This integrated approach to the development and monetisation of Oman’s gas resources, encompassing investments in both the upstream and downstream ends of the gas business, will serve as a new template for the Sultanate’s gas industry, according to the Ministry.
Oman Observer is now on the WhatsApp channel. Click here
