Iraq NEWS

Vagit Alekperov, the President of Lukoil, has met the Iraqi Minister of Oil, at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. They discussed the development of West Qurna-2 project and agreed to consider the possibility of early commissioning of Block 10 of Eridu field. Both the parties also expressed their interest in gas processing and petrochemical projects in Iraq.

ExxonMobil decided to pull out its staff from Iraq as a “precautionary and temporary” measure. Energy Minister of the Middle East nation has termed this decision as “unacceptable and unwarranted”. He further argued that “This withdrawal may send the wrong message about the situation in Iraq, and that’s something we reject”. He has also sent a letter to Exxon officials asking for clarification and enquiring the workers to return.

British oil firm, Genel Energy has inked an agreement to acquire Chevron’s stakes in Iraq oil blocks. Genel will gain ownership of 30% interest in the Sarta licence and 40% interest in the Qara Dagh licence. Until a specific production target is reached in the Sarta license, Genel will account for 50% share of ongoing field development costs. The firm will become the operator of the Qara Dagh licence.

In an interview last week, director for refineries at BPCL said that the downstream major will import 5mn tonnes of various grades of Iraqi crude in 2019. He also said that importing more crude from Iraq will let BPCL to displace some portion of the other Middle East crude. BPCL enhanced the capacity of Kochi refinery to 15mn tpa, which will allow them to process more dirty cheap crudes.

Leading oil services firm, Halliburton has secured a well drilling contract from an Eni-led consortium in Iraq. Over the next two years, the Houston-based firm will utilize up to six rigs to drill development wells in the Zubair Oil Field in Iraq. Italian oil major, Eni leads a consortium of Oxydental, Kogas and Missan on the Zubair field, which has over more than four billion barrels of reserves.

US has asked Iraq to reduce its dependency on Iran. In a meeting with top Iraqi officials in Baghdad, Rick Perry, the US Energy Secretary has urged Iraq to replace Iran with America and open the energy sector for American investment. Presently, Iraq is in a delicate situation because even after the renewed US sanctions, the nation is still reliant on Iranian gas for its electricity production.

If sources were to be believed, state-owned refiner, MRPL has inked a term deal with Iraq’s State Organization for Marketing of Oil (SOMO) to buy 1.5 million tonnes of Basra oil in 2019. MRPL, which runs a 300,000 barrel-per-day refinery in India, is seeking to diversify its crude imports. MRPL didn’t comment on the matter.

DNO ASA is the oil and gas operator of Norway and has announced that the production at Peshkabir field of Iraq has increased up to 50,000 bopd. The company has informed that it has completed the 2018 target before time and below budget. Two wells have been completed recently, out of which Peshkabir-7 is producing over 10,000 bopd from nine Cretaceous zones.

Jersey’s oilfield services firm, Petrofac has extended its deal with an international Iraq-based oil company. The deal is worth £38 million. This unknown Iraqi client has requested Petrofac to continue providing “support maintenance services” and “new production enhancement facilities”. MD, EPS East commented on this deal and said, “We look forward to continuing our focus on safe and efficient delivery and the development of local resources in-country.”

With the recovery of Libyan production and Iraq’s southern exports creating records, the output of OPEC oil has hit a high of this fiscal year, the analysis of Reuters revealed. The production hiked in the month of August and 32.79 million barrels per day were pumped, which is 220,000 bpd more than the July numbers. The progress got restricted due to the US sanction resulting in halt on Iranian shipments.

Natural gas giant, Dana Gas has posted a $24 million in profits for the first half of 2018. Displaying improved underlying business performance, Dana Gas reported a 200% jump in the second-quarter profits to $36 million. The off sukuk restructuring costs sunk the profits by $2 million for the company. Dana took big steps this year in bringing transformational expansion in KRI (Kurdistan Region of Iraq).

The UK-based oilfield services company, Petrofac has bagged £290 million contract by Basra Oil Company. Under the 34-month contract, Petrofac will provide facilities for the expansion of the central processing facility in the Majnoon Field, Southern Iraq. Additionally, two oil processing trains with a capacity of 200,000 barrels of oil per day are also included in the engineering, procurement and construction contract.

Leading oilfield service provider, BHGE received a flare gas recovery contract for the Nassiriya and Al Gharraf oilfields in Iraq. The contract was awarded by the South Gas Company of Iraq (SGC). The GE Company will deploy advanced modular gas processing (NGL) technology to provide solutions for recovering flare gas at Nassiriya and Al Gharraf oilfields. The project is estimated to be delivered by 2021.

A Bloomberg survey has revealed an increment in the crude output of OPEC owing to Saudi Arabia’s near-record production. Oil production of Saudi grew by 230,000 bpd to 10.65 MMbpd in July. The kingdom was joined by Nigeria and Iraq in offsetting losses from Venezuela, Iran, and Libya. The cartel all-in-all produced 32.6 MMbpd. Saudi held up to its promise of preventing crude prices from sabotaging the global economy.

Russia and Saudi Arabia are pushing for a big rise, while Iran, Iraq, and Venezuela are insisting to keep the production quota same as before. Members of OPEC are looking for a way out of this situation and according to sources, are into discussions about delivering 300,000 to 600,000 bpd of additional oil supply to global markets over the next few months.

OPEC’s second biggest producer, Iraq is pressurizing OPEC to strengthen its opposition to plans by Saudi Arabia. Its defiance follows similar resistance from Iran and Venezuela, which implies that three of the five countries that founded OPEC now oppose the Saudi plan. OPEC will meet with its partners on June 22-23 in Vienna. Nevertheless, it’s unclear whether Iraq, Iran, and Venezuela could do much to block the Saudi-Russian plans.

Iran and Iraq have started oil swapping under the swap deal inked between the two countries. The deal was signed in 2017, under which Iraq is about to truck 60,000 bpd of crude oil to Iran, covering all transport costs, via Kirkuk strategic route. Iran, from its end, will deliver to Iraq’s clients through its Kharg terminal in the Persian Gulf, in equal volumes with the same quality.

The Oil Ministry of Iraq yesterday stated that it will sign contracts for oil and gas exploration and development of six blocks. The ministry had held an auction in May, for 11 blocks on offer, near the borders with Iran and Kuwait and in offshore Gulf waters. Five blocks failed to bring investors on board. The contracts have been awarded to UAE-based Crescent Petroleum, China’s Geo-Jade and United Energy Group.