Egypt set for top-10 LNG status as plant restarts

Egypt is planning to reopen one of its two LNG plants by the end of February, Minister of Petroleum & Mineral Resources Tarek El Molla said on Wednesday.

The minister’s comments were made in an interview with Gulf Intelligence, in which he also said state firms EGAS and EGPC would be offering onshore and offshore exploration blocks for bidding in the coming two weeks.

The reopening of the Damietta LNG plant, with a capacity of 4.5 million tonnes per year (tpy), will boost the country’s overall capacity to 12 million tpy.

Together with the revving up of exports from the country’s other LNG facility, Idku, which saw shipments drop in 2020 with the Covid-19 pandemic, the Damietta plant is poised to place Egypt among the world’s top 10 LNG exporters, according to a report from Bloomberg.

Minister El Molla told Gulf Intelligence that Egypt only exported “a few cargoes” in 2020 due to low prices, but has now fully booked volumes from Idku through the end of March.

The Damietta LNG plant is operated by Union Fenosa Gas, a 50-50 joint venture between Eni and Spain’s Naturgy. The company’s tangle with the government over gas supplies caused the plant to be idled in 2012