By Reem Tobokti,
Tripoli, 2 July 2013:
Oil Minister, Abdulbari Al-Arusi has been in talks with Russian oil companies on a trip to . . .[restrict]Moscow.
In particular he met Alexei Miller, the CEO of Gazprom which was a significant investor in Libya. Gazprom abandoned a new offshore development at the start of the revolution.
The two men had their meeting on the fringes of the second summit of the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) in the Russian capital yesterday, and will have almost certainly discussed Gazprom’s full return to Libya.
In a 2007 asset swap with BASF, the owner of Wintershall, Gazprom International obtained a 49 percent stake in concessions C96 and C97. In 2010 output from this pair of properties was two million tons of oil and gas condensate and 227 million cubic metres of gas. Gazprom also won a concession in Area 64 in the Ghadames basin where pre-drilling took place in January 2011.
Also abandoned was a plan to shoot 10,000 square kilometres in offshore block 19, but this programme was abandoned at the revolution together with the rest of Gazprom operations.
The other major Russian oil investor in Libya is Tatneft, which has returned to operations it quit during the revolt. Tatneft, Russia’s sixth largest oil company has invested some $260 million in acreage in the Ghadames basin. [/restrict]
