Home > Chemical News

Chemical News

Middle East: Yemen LNG says production, exports normal despite unrest

https://www.chemnet.com   May 06,2011 Platts
The Yemen LNG project, the biggest foreign investment in the country, continues to operate normally despite unrest in Yemen, the project's general manager said Thursday.

"Everything is normal," said Francois Rafin of Yemen LNG by telephone from Sanaa. "The wells are producing. We are shipping. There's absolutely nothing exciting to report. Beyond that, we have no further comment."

Yemen has been gripped by weeks of anti-government protests. Oil production in Yemen has been halved in recent weeks as producers have pulled out staff and curbed output after an export pipeline explosion, which has also shut the country's sole oil refinery in Aden, industry sources said Wednesday.

Sources say the 120,000 b/d Safer oil export pipeline, which has been down since a March 15 attack, has not yet been repaired because of difficulties accessing the site and it was not immediately clear when it might be repaired.

Some industry sources suggested that the loss of associated gas as a result of the decline in oil output might have an impact on Yemen LNG, a joint venture with Total, should the crisis persist.

Total leads the 6.7 million mt/year Yemen LNG project with a 39.62% share. The French major has said that operations have not yet been affected by the Yemen crisis and staff evacuations, and sources have said Yemen LNG is being fed by gas produced from block 18, where production has been maintained.

Other shareholders in the project are the US' Hunt with 17.22%, South Korea's Kogas (6%), Yemen Gas (16.73%), South Korea's SK Energy (9.55%), Hyundai (5.88%), and the General Authority of Social Security and Pensions with the remaining 5%.

The Yemen LNG launch in 2005 was a milestone for Yemen as the country's largest-ever industrial investment, budgeted at about $4.5 billion.

The project includes a 25 km, 20 inch transfer line linking the two gas processing units in the gas fields of block 18 in the Marib area; a 320 km, 38 inch main pipeline that connects the gas processing units to the liquefaction plant in Balhaf in the southern coast; and a spur line to move domestic gas to the Mabar area in central Yemen, the company said on its website.

The pipeline that carries crude oil from Marib to the Red Sea and has been the target of repeated attacks in recent months. Yemen's oil infrastructure often has been targeted by militant groups active in the country, among them al-Qaeda.

Yemeni tribes also have targeted the country's oil pipelines in protest of government policies, which have come to a head in recent months as the anti-regime protests against the president have intensified.

The production shutdowns come amid mass protests against the rule of President Ali Abdullah Saleh in the once-divided state of Yemen, the poorest nation on the Arabian Peninsula.

An initiative by the six members of the Saudi-led Gulf Cooperation Council members to break the political deadlock broke down at the weekend after Saleh rejected the deal that would see him step down after more than three decades in power.

 Print  |    add to Favorites  |    Close