Drilling at Kuwait’s Durra Field to Start this Year

Drilling at Kuwait’s Durra Field to Start this Year
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Drilling at Kuwait’s Durra Field to Start this Year

Drilling at Kuwait’s Durra Field to Start this Year

Procedures for drilling and construction work on the Durra gas field will begin later this year after engineering studies wrap up later this summer, Kuwait Petroleum Corporation’s (KPC) CEO Sheikh Nawaf Saud Al-Sabah told Reuters on Thursday.

Saudi Arabia and Kuwait affirm they jointly own rights to natural resources in Durra while Iran claims a stake in the Gulf's gas field.

Sheikh Nawaf said the company plans to invest 7 billion Kuwaiti dinars ($22.92 billion) on its upstream operations over the next five years.

He also said that KPC would reach a production capacity of 3.2 million barrels per day (bpd) by the end of this year and expects to increase that to 4 million bpd by 2035.

Earlier, the CEO of the Kuwait Petroleum Corporation told CNBC Arabia that production operations in offshore reservoirs require seven years. “But we expect to start production from Al-Nokhatha field within a shorter period of time,” he said.

The CEO noted that the oil and gas discovery at Al-Nokhatha field supports Kuwait’s strategy to increase its capacity to 4 million bpd by 2035.

On Wednesday, State-owned Kuwait Oil Company (KOC) announced preparations to begin digging six new exploratory wells in the country’s territorial waters, which contains large hydrocarbon resources.

The announcement came after KPC said on Sunday it had made a “giant” oil discovery in the Al-Nokhatha field, with oil reserves estimated at 3.2 billion barrels.



China Discovers Major Oilfield in South China Sea

FILE PHOTO: A cargo ship carrying containers is seen near the Yantian port in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, China May 17, 2020. REUTERS/Martin Pollard/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: A cargo ship carrying containers is seen near the Yantian port in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, China May 17, 2020. REUTERS/Martin Pollard/File Photo
TT
20

China Discovers Major Oilfield in South China Sea

FILE PHOTO: A cargo ship carrying containers is seen near the Yantian port in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, China May 17, 2020. REUTERS/Martin Pollard/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: A cargo ship carrying containers is seen near the Yantian port in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, China May 17, 2020. REUTERS/Martin Pollard/File Photo

The China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) has discovered an oilfield in the South China Sea with proven reserves exceeding 100 million tons, state news agency, Xinhua, reported on Monday.

The newly discovered oilfield in the eastern South China Sea - the Huizhou 19-6 oilfield - was about 170 kilometres from Shenzhen in south China's Guangdong Province, the news agency said.

Daily production of 413 barrels of crude oil and 68,000 cubic meters of natural gas has been yielded after test drilling, it added.

The oilfield marks a breakthrough in China's offshore oil exploration, as it is the country's first large-scale integrated clastic oilfield discovered in deep to ultra-deep layers, CNOOC said.

The company added that offshore oil and gas exploration in deep to ultra-deep layers faces multiple challenges, including high temperatures, high pressures, and complex conditions.

According to the US Energy Information Administration cited in a news agency AFP report, the South China Sea is mostly underexplored because of territorial disputes, but most discovered oil and gas are in uncontested areas.

China claims as its own almost all of the South China Sea, but this is disputed by the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam, Indonesia and Brunei.