sectors | energy & sustainability
Three oil fields - Al Shaheen (pictured), Dukhan, and Idd Al Shargi - account for slightly more than 85 percent of Qatar’s crude oil production capacity. (Image courtesy Maersk Oil)
and which only produces 8000 bbl/d. Indeed, even according to Qatar National Bank (QNB), projections Qatar’s crude oil production levels are expected to reach 800,000 bbl/d by 2017 instead of the 1.2 million bbl/d target previously held by the government. Moreover, Qatar’s plans to offset any decline in oil revenues by a concomitant increase in revenues from its gas sector also look optimistic. For a start, added Cook, the progress of the cornerstone of the country’s plan to increase its use of natural gas from the giant non-associated gas North Field – the development of the Barzan Gas Project (BGP) – has been fraught to say the least. The final completion date for this QP and ExxonMobil joint venture has already been revised to the end of 2021, from the original estimate of 2016, and Train 1 has been at the same level of completeness (95 percent) – according to the firms – for many months now. QNB recently reiterated that Barzan would drive growth in the hydrocarbon sector 0.8 percent in 2015, 1.8 percent in 2016, and 1.9 percent in 2017. However, said Cook, “It’s all very well saying that 1 and 2 [Trains] will produce at least 1.4 billion cubic feet a day of natural gas from the North Field, and that this will lead to a net increase in the country’s hydrocarbons sector revenues, but as yet no concrete developments have been made for some time.” There may also be difficulty ahead in Qatar’s efforts to further develop the North Field, due to the activity of neighbouring Iran, which controls a 3700 square kilometre (km2) sector of the 9700 km2 basin. Last year, the United States Energy Information Administration 34 | The Edge
stated that reports suggest that the high existing production rates on both sides of the field’s shared basin (Iran’s South Pars section and Qatar’s North Field site) have caused the pressure to drop in many wells, reducing flow rates, despite Qatar’s North Field still being the subject of a moratorium on expansion.
Richard Mallinson, senior geopolitical analyst for international energy consultancy, Energy Aspects in London told The Edge that Qatar has repeatedly stated that too much Iranian drilling might impair recovery rates for both sides. “Given this, Qatar has offered to give Iran advice on technology and share the results of the studies on the geology of the basin, while on Iran’s side, it has said that it wants the two countries to work together to maximise production and cooperate on development of the shared resource,” Mallinson added. Nevertheless, while the trans-border issues between the two countries on this basin have yet to result in serious disagreement, as the fields become more mature this may change, he concluded.
Gas-to-liquids sector
Pearl GTL train shuts down for maintenance and upgrade The planned current shutdown of one of the two production trains of Qatar Shell’s flagship Pearl gas-to-liquids (GTL) plant in Ras Laffan Industrial City – scheduled to last a couple of months at least – is designed to allow for more than just routine planned maintenance works.
Qatar’s plans to offset any decline in oil revenues by a concomitant increase in revenues from its gas sector look optimistic.
This is according to London-based Roger Nightingale, CEO of international economic consultancy firm, RN Associates. “Late last year,” he informed The Edge, “Shell [Qatar] did award a long-term EPC [engineering, procurement and construction management services] contract to SNCLavalin that not only related to general maintenance but also to effect changes to the plant, designed to increase production there substantially. The first phase of this upgrade appears to be scheduled to kick in over this two- to three-month period.” Before the current shutdown, the joint Royal Dutch Shell/Qatar Petroleum GTL facility – one of only four such operations worldwide, together with South Africa’s 45,000 barrels per day (bbl/d) capacity