Italian Eni is in negotiations with Dutch Shell company to connect about 23m cubic feet of gas daily from the new Farameet well in its concession area in the western desert to the Obayied gas-processing plant. A source at EGAS said that the well will be closed until the agreement with Shell—owner of Obayied—is completed and a gas line between the well and the processing plant is established. He added that about $6m were spent to drill the Farameet well. The studies were more inclined toward the possibility of the well's production being crude oil, however, with the drilling operation starting, the company discovered the existence of natural gas layers and no oil. He pointed out that the Obayied gas-processing plant's capacity is estimated to be 450m cubic feet of gas every day, with about 400m feet utilised. It has a capacity that could be used to produce the gas of the Farameet well. Farameet is located within the concession area of Italian Eni. The joint company between the partner and the General Petroleum Corporation manage it. Egypt's natural gas production increased to nearly 6.2bn cubic feet of gas daily, instead of 6bn by the end of the past fiscal year, due to the increase in the production rates of the Zohr field. Egypt is seeking to increase its total gas production to 6.75bn cubic feet of gas daily by the end of this year, compared to nearly 6.2bn cubic feet of gas currently. The source said that Egypt's total gas production is currently estimated to be 6.5bn cubic feet of gas daily. About 6.2bn are provided from the local production of Egyptian fields, and about 300m are from importation. He added that the ministry is continuously negotiating with foreign partners to speed up the implementation of the development projects of gas fields to bridge the gap between production and consumption and to achieve self-sufficiency by the end of this year. The Ministry of Petroleum is implementing a project to develop and modernise the petroleum sector to achieve an increase in petroleum production over the upcoming period through the fourth work programme of the project, in order to improve the performance of production activities and increase local production.
