Page 11 - AfrOil Week 22a 2020

AfrOil PIPELINES & TRANSPORT AfrOil
Sonatrach raises stake in Medgaz pipeline to 51%
ALGERIA
ALGERIA’S national oil company (NOC) Sonatrach has become the majority shareholder in Medgaz, the operator of a natural gas pipe- line across the bed of the Mediterranean Sea, through its acquisition of a stake in the link from CEPSA (Spain).
Sonatrach confirmed the purchase in a state- ment dated May 31, saying that it had arranged to buy 19.1% of CEPSA’s stake in Medgaz, equiv- alent to 8.04% of total equity in the pipeline. This purchase brought Sonatrach’s holdings in Med- gaz up from 42.96% to 51%, it explained.
“With this acquisition, Sonatrach becomes a 51% shareholder in the new shareholding of Medgaz with its historic partner Naturgy [Spain] at 49% and thus strengthens its position as a major and reliable supplier of Algerian gas to importing customers to Europe, in particular the Iberian Peninsula through the Medgaz gas pipeline,” the company said.
Naturgy and Sonatrach had agreed last Octo- ber to buy out CEPSA’s stake in Medgaz. That deal raised the former company’s holding in the pipeline operator up by 34.05% from the previ- ous level of 14.95%.
Sonatrach did not disclose the financial terms of the deal. But it did go on to say that it intended to work with Naturgy to move forward with the expansion of the Medgaz system in 2021. The
pipeline’s capacity is due to rise from 8.3bn cubic metres per year to 10.2 bcm per year following the construction of a fourth turbo-compressor unit for the Beni-Saf gas compression station in Algeria, it stated.
Medgaz is the operator of a 24-inch (610- mm) pipeline that follows a 210-km route across the floor of the Mediterranean from Beni-Saf, Algeria, to Almería, Spain. On the Algerian side, the Medgaz system is connected to the terminus of a domestic conduit that carries gas from Hassi R’Mel and other fields. On the Spanish side, it is connected to the Almería-Albacete line.™
Egypt unveils $19bn petchem strategy
The pipeline links Algeria to Spain’s domestic gas network (Image: Medgaz)
INVESTMENT
EGYPT
EGYPT has a new strategy targeting the devel- opment of $19bn of new petrochemical projects by 2035, Petroleum Minister Tarek El-Mulla said on May 25.
The North African country is looking to build up its petrochemicals industry to find more uses for its oil and gas and meet growing domestic demand for petrochemical products.
The new projects include two large refining and petrochemicals complexes in SCzone and New Alamein City. The SCzone complex is slated to cost $7.5bn, and will produce 202,000 tonnes per year of petrochemicals and 650,000 tpy of petroleum products. An initial agree- ment has been signed with the US’ Bechtel on its development. Earlier a feasibility study was carried out by the UK’s Wood.
Financing is expected to come from the
US International Development Finance Corp. (USDFC) and US Exim Bank.
The complex in New Alamein City is due to cost $8.5bn and turn out 1mn tpy of petrochem- icals and 850,000 tpy of petroleum products. An initial deal is in place with a joint venture between PSW Group and another UK firm.
Italy’s Saipem and Egypt’s Petrojet have also bagged a deal to build a 36,000 tpy polybutadi- ene unit in Alexandria. The project is valued at $183mn.
Egypt’s Sun Egypt Group and Wadi El Nil Developments, and the UAE’s Zafcomm, have also secured a construction contract for a $117mn, 110,000 tpy methanol derivatives plant in Damietta. Petrojet, meanwhile, has been selected for a medium-density fibreboard (MDF) plant in Beheira.
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