A new gas discovery in Egypt’s Western Desert has added another timely boost to the country’s strained upstream portfolio. The well, identified as Gomana-1, encountered several gas-bearing intervals based on electric-log data, with early tests indicating output of around 36 million cubic feet per day, according to the Daily News Egypt.
The find is now undergoing reserve evaluation before being mapped into the operator’s development sequence.
The well is operated by Khalda Petroleum Company, one of Egypt’s larger onshore joint ventures and a long-running partnership between the state and Apache, whose Western Desert portfolio has expanded over decades of continuous drilling campaigns. Khalda’s assets tend to deliver fast-cycle, lower-cost volumes, making them an important counterweight to Egypt’s larger and more technically demanding offshore hubs.
This latest addition follows two Western Desert discoveries earlier in November. On 8 November, the petroleum ministry confirmed a new gas find at the Badr-15 field operated by Badr El Din Petroleum, yielding roughly 16 million cubic feet per day and an estimated 15 billion cubic feet of recoverable resources, according to Anadolu Agency. A subsequent update from the Ecofin Agency highlighted initial condensate output of around 750 barrels per day. These discoveries are small individually, but they illustrate where Egypt’s incremental gains are currently coming from: onshore fields with rapid drilling cycles and modest upfront capital requirements.
The string of discoveries comes as Egypt struggles to meet domestic gas demand. Output at major offshore hubs, particularly Zohr, continues to fall short of earlier expectations, while operators have slowed activity as arrears accumulate. The result is Cairo’s increased reliance on any near-term additions it can bring online, alongside broader upstream efforts, including a roughly $6-billion crude-oil investment push referenced in recent coverage and the still-unresolved 35-billion-dollar gas framework.
By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com
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