RIYADH, 20 February 2004 — Saudi Arabia will formally sign gas exploration and production contracts awarded to Spanish, Italian, Chinese and Russian firms in Riyadh on March 7, the Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources announced yesterday.
The deals to explore for and produce natural gas in the Rub Al-Khali, or Empty Quarter, were agreed last month with China Petroleum and Chemical Corp. (Sinopec), Russia’s giant Lukoil and a consortium formed by Spanish oil group Repsol YPF and Italy’s Eni.
“The international oil companies will partner with (state-owned) Saudi Aramco in the upstream gas ventures,” said an invitation for the signing ceremony.
The signing will signal the beginning of “the search for gas reservoirs in the north Rub Al-Khali Basin,” it said.
The firms will be engaged in partnership with Saudi Aramco in gas exploration and production in three regions with a total area of 120,000 square kilometers (46,000 square miles), according to previous announcements.
The area has been divided into three sections designated A, B and C. The value of the deals has not been revealed.
In November, Saudi Arabia signed a multibillion-dollar landmark deal with a consortium led by majors Royal Dutch Shell and Total for gas exploration and production in the southern part of the Kingdom.
Saudi Arabia, which sits atop the world’s biggest oil reserves, has proven natural gas reserves of 235 trillion cubic feet (6.654 trillion cubic meters), the fourth largest.
Current gas production in the Kingdom is around seven billion cubic feet (198.2 million cubic meters) daily but there are plans to boost it to about 10 billion cubic feet (283.2 million cubic meters) per day by 2010.
