Filenews 13 June 2022
Qatar yesterday selected France's TotalEnergies as its first foreign partner to develop the world's largest deposit, which is expected to help address Europe's energy concerns. The French giant will hold a 6.25% stake in the development of the giant North Field East field, which will help Qatar increase liquefied natural gas (LNG) production by more than 60% by 2027, Qatar said in a press conference. Minister of Energy Serida al-Kambi.
As he said, this is a marriage and not a simple involvement of TotalEnergies, as the agreement will last until 2054. Other energy companies will join the joint venture with the state Qatar Energy (QE), but none will have a larger share than TotalEnergies , al-Kambi said, without revealing the names of the other companies. Industry sources quoted by AFP as saying that ExxonMobil, Shell and ConocoPhillips are also expected to participate in the expansion at a total cost of $ 28 billion, a cost that Qatar initially wanted to finance on its own. "We have completed the selection process and signed the agreements," al-Kambi said, adding that the remaining names would be announced in the near future. For his part, TotalEnergies Chief Executive Officer Patrick Pouyan said the agreement with Qatar would help the company offset its withdrawal from Russia following Moscow's invasion of Ukraine. Qatar is one of the world's leading LNG producers along with the US and Australia. Qatar Energy estimates that North Field holds about 10% of the world's known gas reserves. So far, South Korea, Japan and China are the largest LNG pipelines, but in the wake of the energy crisis in Europe, the Gulf state has helped Britain with additional supplies and has already announced a cooperation agreement with Germany. Until now, Europe has rejected the long-standing agreements that Qatar sought, but the conflict in Ukraine has led to a change in that attitude.