Italian multinational oil and gas company Eni announced in a statement on Thursday a new oil discovery at the A-2X exploration prospect, located in the South West Meleiha license in the Egyptian Western Desert. The well is the first drilled by Eni to explore the deep geological sequences of the Faghur Basin, the company said. "The exploratory well, named SWM A-2X, has been drilled to a total depth of 5,090 meters and encountered 18 meters of light oil in the Paleozoic sandstones of Dessouky Formation of Carboniferous age," Eni said in a statement. "Based on Competent Authority's approval, the production is expected to be linked to already existing nearby infrastructures and then shipped to El-Hamra Terminal through existing pipelines," the statement added. Egypt's Minister of Oil Tarek El-Mullah said that the exploration using the latest technologies in the Western Desert area has shown very promising results, according to Ahram Arabic website. El-Mullah added that there will continue to be intensified exploration in the area, especially with the already existing infrastructure that would allow the production of high quality crude oil. Last week, Eni announced in a statement the start of production at the Zohr gas field's second production unit (T-1), which will increase the production capacity by 400 million standard cubic feet per day (MMSCFD). The step comes four months after gas production started at Zohr, the largest offshore gas field in the Mediterranean. Zohr now has a capacity of 800 MMSCFD, or 150,000 barrels of oil equivalent (BOE) per day, the company said. Eni is Egypt's leading LNG producer, producing around 250,000 BOE per day.
