The Egyptian Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, Tarek El Molla, stated that Egypt has recently signed 70 new oil and gas exploration agreements after agreeing with international oil companies (IOCs) to amend natural gas prices which helped in attracting new investments, reported Al Borsa.

He affirmed that Italian Eni aims to link 1bcf/d of gas to the national grid by the end of 2017 or within the first quarter of 2018. The company further plans to increase production gradually to reach 2.7bcf/d by 2020.

Moreover, the first development phase of the northern Alexandria concession and West Mediterranean deep water concession is to be completed by the third quarter of 2017, with a production capacity of 450mcf/d of gas. The project is to add a total of around 1.9bcf/d of gas to the national grid when finalized by the second quarter of 2019.

In related news, Egypt Oil&Gas reported that IOCs had agreed to speed up the exploration and production (E&P) of new discoveries in the country. They had also agreed to build new refineries, and add production lines to the existing refining facilities.

Speaking at ADIPEC earlier in November, Tarek El Molla said that the ministry is aiming to achieve Egypt’s energy self-sufficiency by 2020/2021 by adding new petroleum projects to the production grid.