KUWAIT: Kuwait Oil Corporation will invite international companies to help develop offshore oil and gas discoveries by its state-owned arm Kuwait Oil Company, Prime Minister Ahmad Abdullah Al Ahmad Al Sabah said at a meeting on Tuesday.
The project targets three offshore oil and gas fields discovered in 2025 and is expected to increase Kuwait’s production capacity from the current 3 million barrels per day to 4 million barrels per day by 2035, Kuwait Oil CEO Sheikh Nawaf Saud Al-Sabah said in a separate press conference, also at the Kuwait Oil and Gas Show.
He said the state would maintain sole ownership of the hydrocarbons.
Gulf governments are ramping up infrastructure deals with foreign investors as oil prices have fallen more than 25% in two years, leaving them well below the levels needed to fund economic diversification. This has led Kuwait and other Gulf states to open up their energy assets to global capital.
Reuters reported on Wednesday that Kuwait plans to begin selling stakes in its oil pipeline network as early as February in a deal that could raise up to $7 billion, three sources familiar with the matter said.
Sheikh Nawaf said the pipeline project would help finance Kuwait’s plans to expand its oil production, and investor interest was “very strong”.
He said Kuwait Oil had received commitments from international and local banks worth “five times the required amount”, without providing details.
Oil Minister Tariq al-Rumi told Reuters on Monday that he expects bidding for the Dura oil and gas field project in cooperation with Saudi Arabia to begin this year.
Kuwait’s share of production in the Neutral Zone, which is co-managed with Saudi Arabia, is more than 200,000 barrels per day, and total production is more than 400,000 barrels per day, “higher than the production level before the closure of the fields,” Sheikh Nawaf said.
(Reporting by Ahmed Hagagy; Writing by Ahmed Elimam; Editing by Kirsten Donovan and Bernadette Bohm)
