Natural gas production in the Middle East will increase by about 14 billion cubic feet per day by 2030, according to Wood Mackenzie, an amount equivalent to the gas consumption of the electricity sector in Europe.
the future of gas in the region
In this regard, Cristol Energy CEO Carol Nakhle said in an interview with Sky News Arabia that the Middle East region has not focused on its gas wealth as optimally as it has on oil, for several reasons, one of which is that revenue from oil sales is higher than revenue from gas sales, and the other issue is that gas needs infrastructure investment.
She added: “What we see today is a pattern that started a few years ago. We have seen countries like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates set bold targets for production and export Saudi Arabia has set a gas export target for 2030, doubling gas production and investing in shale gas production in the region.”
Carroll pointed out that “this trend is welcome, but we must not forget that there are countries like Iraq which annually burn more gas than they consume locally, so the investments which are pumped now in the gas production sector are not only aimed at increasing production and export capacity, but also to achieve climate objectives for the region, by mitigating the climate burden and carbon emissions of countries such as the Iraq and others.
Regarding the challenges facing investments in the gas sector, Carole Nakhle said: “The cost of investing in LNG export infrastructure is very high, and to take an example, Qatar has not been able to reach the current export potential overnight, except after its huge investments in infrastructure.” However, the silver lining is that gas markets have grown significantly over the past few years, especially in opportunities for investment in liquid natural gas.
He said that there is another challenge facing investments in the gas sector, namely the lack of pipelines to transport this gas in the region. Although there are many places to produce and store gas, there is only one pipeline, which is the Dolphin pipeline. , “which is something to work on.” solve it, but there are geopolitical factors that affect this problem.”
Energy transformation and its sources
Regarding the process of transition to renewable and clean energy, the CEO of Kristol Energy said: “There is now a global conviction that we still need fossil fuels, for more years than today. , and even when energy transformation takes place in the future in a significant way, we will still need oil and gas.” And to a lesser extent, of coal, and when we enhance the use of carbon capture technology, we increase the production and consumption of oil and gas, but reduce the environmental burden of their production and their impact on the climate, this technology therefore contributes to the continuation of investments in the oil and gas sector, its production and consumption.
Carroll added that this technology is not new, and has been around for years, and foreign and local companies know how to use and invest in carbon capture technology, but the most important reason behind the lack development of this technology is the economic challenges. , because the major oil companies in the region have sufficient funding, but there are question marks about the extent of the continuity and the volume of investment that these companies will make in the development of this technology, but Carole Nakhle expects this technology to be further pushed towards its development in the Middle East region.
Regarding the possibility of carbon capture technology facilitating the transition to clean energy, Carroll said the world has become more convinced that the energy transition still takes time and will not happen. overnight, and that it will require all available energy sources, but the more we use fossil fuels during this transformation, with less impact on the environment, the better and more developed the future of renewable energies.
According to Carroll, the energy transition is now considered optional and not something that happens at an institutional level, and there will be no energy sources that will replace other sources, and we will use all energy sources available.
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