Eni has made a gas discovery of global importance in the Egyptian offshore of the Mediterranean Sea, at the exploration prospect known as Zohr. The Zohr 1X well, through which the discovery was made, is located at a depth of 1.450 meters in the Shorouk block, signed in January 2014 with the Egyptian Ministry of Petroleum and with the Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (EGAS) following a competitive international tender.
From the geological and geophysical information available, and from the data acquired in the discovery well, the supergiant field has a resource potential of up to 850 billion cubic meters of gas in place (5,5 billion barrels of oil equivalent) and an extension about 100 square kilometers. Zohr represents the largest gas discovery ever made in Egypt and the Mediterranean Sea and could become one of the largest gas discoveries in the world. This exploration success will make a major contribution to meeting Egypt's demand for natural gas for decades.
Eni will immediately carry out the delineation activities of the field to ensure the accelerated development of the discovery that makes the best use of the already existing infrastructures, at sea and on land.2The Zohr 1X well, which was drilled to a total depth of 4.131 meters, met about 630 meters of hydrocarbon column in a carbonate sequence of Miocene age with excellent reservoir rock properties. The Zohr structure also has potential at greater depths, which will be investigated in the future through a dedicated borehole.
Eni's CEO, Claudio Descalzi, went to Cairo in the past few hours to update the Egyptian President, Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, on this important success, and to talk about the new discovery with the country's Prime Minister, Ibrahim Mahlab , and with the Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, Sherif Ismail. Eni's CEO commented: “It's a really important day for our company and Eni's people. This important result is the confirmation of our skills and our capacity for technological innovation with immediate operational application, and above all demonstrates the spirit of strong collaboration between all the corporate components which are the basis of these great successes. The strategy that has led us to insist on research in mature areas of countries that we have known for decades has proved successful, proving that Egypt still has great potential. This historic discovery will be able to transform the energy scenario of an entire country, which has welcomed us for over 60 years. Exploration remains at the heart of our growth strategy: in the last 7 years we have discovered 10 billion barrels of resources and 300 million in the last six months, thus confirming Eni's position at the top of the industry. This discovery takes on even greater value since it was made in Egypt, a strategic country for Eni, where important synergies with existing installations can be exploited, allowing us to rapidly start production". Eni, through its subsidiary IEOC Production BV, holds the Shorouk license share of 100% and is the operator. Eni has been present in Egypt since 1954, where it operates through the IEOC, and has historically been a forerunner in the exploration and exploitation of gas resources in the country since the discovery of the Abu Maadi field in 1967.
Using new exploration models and maximizing the use of new operating technologies, Eni, through the operating companies equally owned by EGPC, AGIBA and PETROBEL, has doubled oil production in the last 3 years in the Western Desert and Abu Rudeis concessions in Gulf of Suez and given new production impetus in the onshore Nile Delta following the discovery of Nidoco NW 2 (Nooros prospect) already in production. Eni is the leading hydrocarbon producer in the country with an equity production of around 200 barrels of oil equivalent per day.
