BP Starts up Egyptian Field
BP announced on October 26 the start-up of the Qattameya gas field at Egypt's offshore North Damietta concession.
Qattameya, in the East Nile Delta, will produce up to 50mn ft3/day (around 517mn m3/year) of gas. It is producing from one well tied back via a 50-km pipeline and 50-km umbilical to the Ha'py and Tuart field development. The gas is supplied to Egypt's national grid.
"By building on BP's significant existing assets and infrastructure offshore Egypt, we were able to develop Qattameya efficiently and economically," the UK major's North Africa regional president Karim Alaa commented. "We are proud to have brought this project safely onstream through an extremely challenging period. Our team continues to work to support Egypt realising the potential of its energy resources."
Qattameya was discovered in 2017 in waters 108 m deep. BP has a 100% stake in the North Damietta concession.
Egyptian gas production began rising again in 2017 after years of decline, supported by the launch of the 30-trillion ft3 Zohr field by Italy's Eni. Since then, BP, Eni and others have discovered a number of other offshore fields that could potentially drive growth further. Eni and BP brought on stream the Baltim South West field in September last year.