Natural Gas World
  • Natural Gas News

    Globes: Delek, Noble oppose emerging gas compromise

    old

Summary

Noble Energy does not accept separate marketing, and Delek is unwilling to sell its rights in Karish and Tanin as well as Tamar.

by:

Posted in:

Press Notes

Print This Article

Globes: Delek, Noble oppose emerging gas compromise

Noble Energy is expected to oppose the separate marketing model for the Tamar and Leviathan natural gas reservoirs, and Delek Group Ltd. is opposing the sale of its holdings in the Tamar field as well as the Karish, and Tanin reservoirs, according to senior natural gas sector sources.

Antitrust Authority head Prof. David Gilo has held hearings in recent days for each partner in the Leviathan reservoir: Delek Group, Noble Energy, and Ratio Oil Exploration (1992) LP. The hearings were conducted to determine whether Delek Group and Noble Energy's purchase of 85% of the rights in the Leviathan reservoir from Ratio Oil was illegal, and created an agreement in restraint of trade.

Simultaneously with the legal proceedings, representatives of the Ministries of Finance and Energy met in recent weeks with Antitrust Authority representatives to formulate a compromise acceptable to all of them. Such a compromise must facilitate competition in the energy sector on the one hand, and rapid development of the Leviathan reservoir and the supply of gas from it to the local economy on the other.

According to the emerging proposal, published exclusively in "Globes," Delek Group will sell its holdings in the Tamar reservoir to a third party, while Noble Energy will retain its holdings in both reservoirs. The hoped for competition between the two reservoirs will be achieved through marketing of the gas to the domestic market, for which there are two main options. In the first, there will be a single marketer to the domestic market for each reservoir. Isramco Negev 2 LP will be the marketer for the Tamar reservoir, and Ratio Oil will be the marketer for the Leviathan reservoir. In the other option, all the partners in both reservoirs will be marketers, except for Noble Energy. Under this proposal, Isramco and another company that will buy Delek Group's holdings will be the marketers for the Tamar reservoir, and Ratio Oil and Delek Group will be the marketers for Leviathan.

Read the fill article HERE

Related Articles