Italian producer Eni has successfully produced and lifted the initial cargo from the recently reactivated Damietta natural gas liquefaction plant in Egypt. The LNG cargo was the first produced by the plant since it was shuttered over 8 years ago.
Eni signed agreements with the Egyptian government, Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation (EGPC), the Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (EGAS), and Spain’s Naturgy at the end of last year paving the way for the restart.
The Damietta plant has a capacity of 7.56 Bcm per year but has been idle since November 2012.
The agreements resulted in the settlement of the pending disputes of Union Fenosa Gas and SEGAS with EGAS and Arab Republic of Egypt and the subsequent corporate restructuring of Union Fenosa Gas (UFG), whose assets will be shared between the partners ENI and Naturgy.
The Damietta plant was 80% owned by UFG, a joint venture between ENI and Naturgy, with the rest split evenly between EGAS and EGPC. Under the new agreement, the plant is 50% owned by Eni, 40% by EGAS, and 10% EGPC.
According to Eni, the lifting of the new LNG cargo represents an important milestone in the process to complete the agreement reached and aimed at settling all pending disputes between the parties and at restarting the operations at the plant.
“At this stage the agreement has already received all the authorizations of the competent authorities and its final closing is expected in the first half of March,” said Eni in a statement.