Egypt's natural gas production has increased to 6.8bn standard cubic feet per day (scf/day), compared to 6.2bn scf/day last year after adding the production of the second phase of the West Nile Delta project "North Alexandria" and other wells to the national grid. A source at the Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (EGAS) told Daily News Egypt that the new projects were connected to the production, such as Zohr, Nawras, North Alexandria, and 9B, have contributed to compensating the natural decline rate of fields and increasing production. It is targeted to increase Egypt's natural gas production to 7.5bn scf/day during the upcoming fiscal year, he added. The source explained that the decline of the local market's consumption of natural gas to 5.5 scf/day over the current period was the result of the decline in electricity plants' fuel consumption in winter. He added that the rate of natural gas consumption in the local market was growing annually, according to the plan of industrial and construction development with the increase in the number of cars that operate with natural gas. The electricity consumption sector represents 61% of the total natural gas consumption, while the rest of the sectors consuming gas (industry, houses, cars, and petroleum and its derivatives) account for 39% of consumption. The source added that the rate of local gas consumption will increase again to 7bn scf/day during the upcoming fiscal year (FY), compared to 6.2bn scf/day during the current FY. The average consumption of the domestic gas market will increase to about 9bn scf/day by 2020/2021, according to the industrial development plan, due to the increase in production capacity of electricity, house gas lines, and converting more cars to run by gas instead of petroleum. Egypt's production plan will contribute in increasing natural gas production from the fields of Zohr, North Alexandria, and Borlos in order to cover consumption rates, especially after operating the liquification plants for gas coming from Cyprus and Israel, the source said. He noted that Egypt has halted importing liquefied natural gas (LNG) shipments, as it had achieved the domestic self-sufficiency, and the Singaporean-Norwegian gasification ship (PW Gas) will be used in case of the need for importing gas.
