Tunisia Gas Field on Track for 2019 Launch
Austria’s OMV has confirmed to NGW that its long-delayed Nawara gas project in Tunisia will start up by the end of this year.
“The construction phase is finalised and the commissioning phase is ongoing,” a spokesperson told NGW on November 13, noting that a plateau production rate of 2.4mn m3/day would be reached within six months of first gas. The project’s budget is €1bn ($1.1bn), the representative said.
OMV partnered with Tunisia’s national oil company in 2003 to explore a block in Tunisia’s southern Tataouine province, discovering the Nawara field three years later. Italy’s Eni later joined the project, only to exit in 2012.
Nayara was initially scheduled for launch in 2016, but low oil prices, land management issues and social unrest in Tunisia caused delays and cost overruns.
The project includes a central processing facility at Nawara, which flows gas via a 370-km pipeline to a new gas treatment plant in Tunisia’s northern port city of Gabes. Its commissioning will boost Tunisia’s gas output to 65,000 boe/day, local authorities have said, helping the country cut its fuel imports and narrow its trade deficit. Tunisia is heavily reliant on imports from Algeria, whose pipeline exports cross into Tunisia on their way to Europe.