BP remains ambitious on gas in Egypt, despite weak oil prices

Britain's BP Plc aims to double natural gas production in Egypt in the next four years despite weak oil prices as Egypt's burgeoning energy market offers hope for its battered economy. Egypt is on a drive to ramp up oil and gas production - aggressively signing exploration contracts, renegotiating production prices, and lobbying companies to speed up projects even as firms world-wide scale back.
Through joint ventures with Italy's Eni and the Egyptian government, BP currently produces 10 percent of Egypt's oil production and 30 percent of its gas. The company says it has no intention of backtracking on its pledge to speed up production at recent discoveries.
"BP's plan is to double our gas production in Egypt, before the end of this decade," BP North Africa regional President Hesham Mekawi said in an interview with Reuters.
BP currently produces around 1.4-1.5 billion cubic feet of gas per day in Egypt. BP's expansion plans come as crude oil prices hit 12-year lows. Last week the company announced it would slash 5 percent of its global workforce, as many as 20,000 jobs.
In Egypt, major discoveries such as Zohr, a Mediterranean gas field discovered by Eni in August, have kept companies interested in maintaining strong positions in the region, where massive deposits are believed to remain untapped.
The lion's share of additional production that BP will bring online in the next few years will come from its West Nile Delta project, which is expected to reach around 1.2 billion cubic feet per day starting in 2017, Mekawi said.
Atoll, an eastern Nile Delta discovery BP made last March, could bring 250 million cubic feet per day online by as early as late 2017, Mekawi said.
"(Atoll) is a very good example of how we're moving fast and our partnership in Egypt is very successful. We had a discovery, and based on our confidence in Egypt we decided to move forward quickly," said Mekawi.
BP's efforts could help close Egypt's energy gap as consumption has ballooned and production declined.
The crisis has forced the Arab world's most populous nation to dig deeply into scarce foreign currency reserves to keep homes lit and factories running.
Egypt will spend an estimated $8 billion on energy imports this fiscal year, the oil minister said recently.