By Libya Herald staff.
Tripoli, 14 May 2015:
Eni has announced that its production . . .[restrict]in Libya now exceeds pre-revolution levels.
Despite a multitude of challenges, the state-owned Italian company is now producing some 300,000 barrels per day (bpd), more than the 280,000 bpd during the Qaddafi regime. In March it was understood to be producing some 250,000 barrels of oil and gas equivalent through its fields El Fil and Wafa in the south west Libya, pumped to Mellitah port in the north west.
Eni’s CEO Claudio Descalzi has recently expressed his concern over deteriorating security conditions in the country but said despite the problems operations were continuing as normal. Descalzi added that the increasing presence of the Islamic State in Libya was particularly worrying.
The company has reduced its expatriate workforce to reduce insurance liabilities due to threats of abductions. It still has Italian staff on its offshore oil platforms but has removed all Italians from its mainland installations.
Moreover it has had to deal with numerous interruptions due to strikes and attacks on pipelines. Eni’s fields have remained largely unaffected by IS attacks on oilfields.
Eni is one of the few foreign oil companies to remain in Libya and continue production in the face of these challenges. Not only has it remained, it has continued exploration. In March it announced a significant offshore gas discovery.
Eni started production from its Wafa and Bahr Essalam fields in 2004. The energy company has been present in Libya since 1959.
The Eni-operated Mellitah treatment and compressor plant was running at 90 percent capacity in February. The majority of its gas goes to Italy via the GreenStream pipeline with the remaining being used to fuel the 400MW Ruwais power station.
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