Zohr field is now 91% complete: Minister

CAIRO – 15 October 2017: The Mediterranean’s largest gas field Zohr is now 91 percent complete as work is proceeding on schedule, Minister of Petroleum Tarek El-Molla said Sunday.

Molla made the statements as he was visiting the Zohr development field site on the Mediterranean on Sunday, where he followed up on the work progress of the onshore and offshore facilities, according to a statement from the Ministry of Petroleum.

The second phase of the project is scheduled to start after the first phase begins production by the end of 2017, Molla added.

“During the last period, we have finished the needed preparations to sign the contracts of the second phase,” the minister said.

A set of practical experiments are expected to be conducted at Zohr before the end of October to produce an estimated 350 million cubic feet (MMCF) of gas per day and to be increased up to 1,000 MMCF by the end of 2017.

Zohr is the largest natural gas field found in the Mediterranean and was discovered in 2015 by Italy’s Eni. The field has an area of 100 square meters at a depth of 1,450 meters.

Investing around $10 billion in the project; Eni is estimating total output of the field to be approximately 30 trillion cubic feet of gas.

The field will start production through three phases. The first phase will see an output of one billion cubic feet per day. When all seven fields are complete by 2019, this amount will increase to 2.7 billion cubic feet per day.

The field is expected to secure Egypt’s domestic needs of gas after it has become a net importer of gas following a cut in production after the January revolution.