Qatar’s gas power

Qatar is mainly known as a gas player, with its reserve base centred on the offshore North Fields which adjoin Iran’s South Pars complex. The country accelerated into world gas export market leadership in 2006 and now plans to increase LNG production to 77 million tonnes a year by early 2010 through a number of large-scale projects.

Regional exports through the Dolphin Energy pipeline are already feeding the UAE and Oman much needed gas. The pipeline can currently carry up to a maximum of 2 billion standard cubic feet a day (scf/day) of refined methane gas from Qatar. Its design capacity is 3.2 billion scf/day. Usage of the additional 1.2 billion scf/day capacity is subject to a future agreement between Dolphin Energy and the Qatari authorities, though this has not yet materialised.

Further new gas initiatives await a review of the country’s reservoirs following a moratorium imposed in 2003 banning further development on the super-giant North Field.

The Qatargas joint ventures could quickly increase production capacity by about 12 million tonnes per year once a moratorium on new LNG projects on the North Field is lifted, Qatargas CEO Faisal Al-Suwaidi recently told reporters at the World Natural Gas conference in Buenos Aires.

Al-Suwaidi said the new capacity would come from removing bottlenecks in existing LNG production trains. Qatar imposed the moratorium on new LNG projects at its giant North Field, reasoning it needed time to study and take stock of how the reservoir responded to higher production levels.

Qatar operates several joint ventures with international oil companies to produce LNG under the Qatargas and Rasgas operating companies.

Qatar is the smallest oil producer in OPEC. Its proven oil reserves stand at around 15.2 billion barrels. The onshore Dukhan field, located along the west coast of the peninsula, is the country’s largest producing oil field.

Qatar also has six offshore fields: Bul Hanine, Maydan Mahzam, Id al-Shargi North Dome, al-Shaheen, al-Rayyan, and al-Khalij. Despite the country’s significant oil production and reserves, oil accounts for less than 15% of its domestic energy consumption.

Qatar’s North Field holds more than 900 trillion cubic feet of natural gas reserves, the largest non-associated natural gas field in the world.

Qatar’s proven natural gas reserves stood at 910.5 trillion cubic feet (Tcf) as of January 2007, about 15% of total world reserves and the third-largest in the world behind Russia and Iran. Most of Qatar’s natural gas is located in the massive offshore North Field, a geological extension of Iran’s South Pars field, which holds an additional 280 Tcf of recoverable natural gas reserves.

Qatar has focused on enhanced oil recovery (EOR) projects to extend the life of its oil fields, particularly at the onshore Dukhan field, and, through its partnership with Maersk Oil Qatar, a massive $6 billion investment to stem decline and boost output from the Al-Shaheen field. Most new exploration and production (E&P) work is being carried out by international oil companies in offshore areas through Production Sharing Contracts (PSC), including ExxonMobil, Chevron, and Total.

While there is substantial E&P work underway, there have not been any major oil discoveries in Qatar during the last decade.

Qatar Petroleum is actively pursuing a number of world-scale gas-to-liquids conversion projects for the production of synthetic fuels and base oil stocks. The projects are all integrated with offshore development to supply the large amounts of natural gas feedstock needed for these projects.

As the focus shifts away from the mega-export projects which have dominated the Ras Laffan landscape over the last decade, QP is turning its sights to major domestic projects. QP is partnering with ExxonMobil on two domestic gas development and pipeline projects: Al Khaleej Gas (AKG) and Barzan Gas. AKG produces pipeline natural gas for local and regional power generation. AKG-1 started up in 2005. AKG-2 is being built and will double the production of natural gas. ExxonMobil is working with Qatar and Qatar Petroleum on further development of pipeline gas through the Barzan project. When operational, Barzan and AKG-2 will produce almost 3 billion cubic feet per day of natural gas to meet Qatar’s infrastructure and industrial needs.

QUICK FACTS

• Proven oil reserves: 15.2 billion barrels
• Oil production: 1.1 million barrels per day
• Oil consumption: 99,000 barrels per day
• Crude oil distillation capacity: 200 000 barrels per day
• Major ports: Umm Said, Ras Laffan
• Major refineries: Umm Said (200 000 bpd capacity)