Egypt discovers new oil site

The Egyptian Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources announced on Thursday that it has discovered a new oil site at the Gulf of Suez.

Petrogulf Misr joint company discovered the new site on behalf of Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation (EGPC), Pico GOS Petroleum Company Limited and the Egyptian unit of Kuwait Foreign Petroleum Exploration Company (KUFPEC), the ministry said.

It is estimated to initially produce 2,000 barrels of crude oil per day in the shallow waters of Geisum concession south of the Gulf of Suez.

Indications showed that the discovery, referred to as GNN-4, contains about 70 million barrels of extractable crude oil, the Egyptian Oil Ministry said in a statement.

The concession is technically supervised by Ganoub El Wadi Petroleum Holding Co., according to the statement.

In early June, Egypt announced a new oil discovery made by Borg Al Arab Petroleum Company at Abu Sennan concession in the Western Desert, with a planned daily production rate of 4,100 barrels of crude oil and 18 million cubic feet of natural gas.

Similarly, in late 2019, the company announced a petroleum discovery in ASH-2 area of the oil-rich Abu Sennan, with an average production rate of 7,000 barrels of crude oil and 10 million cubic feet of natural gas per day.

However, Egypt witnessed a seven per cent increase in oil and gas production in 2019 by producing some 650,000 barrels of crude oil and 7.2 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day.

Egypt’s largest Zohr offshore gas field in the Mediterranean Sea, which was discovered by Italy’s giant, Eni in 2015, greatly contributes to the country’s natural gas production as it produces alone about 2.7 billion cubic feet daily.