Italian Eni´s CEO, Claudio Descalzi, met with Egyptian Prime Minister Sherif Ismail on August 1st to discuss Eni’s operations to develop the Zohr field, Egypt Oil & Gas reported.

Work on the field is 80% complete.

The meeting was attended by the Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, Tarek El Molla, and the participants discussed the impact of the mega field on the country’s economy.

“With a potential of 850 billion cubic meters of gas in place, not only will Zohr be able to satisfy almost all of the total domestic gas demand for the coming decades, it will also allow Egypt to return to being a net energy exporter,” Eni stated.

Descalzi noted that Eni will inject half of its $3.5 billion investment in Egypt.

The Egyptian Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources announced that production at the Zohr field will start in November 2017.

The ministry explained that the wells will be prepared during October as the infrastructure will be finalized and pumping and production pipelines will be constructed before installing production equipment. The ministry expects production from Zohr to reach 1 billion cubic feet per day starting in November.

Zohr field was discovered by Eni in 2015. It holds 850 billion cubic meters of gas.