Eni-Total fail to find exploitable gas off Cyprus

NICOSIA-Agence France-Presse

Greek Cyprus said on Sept. 12 that an exploratory drill by Italian-French venture Eni-Total in waters off the Mediterranean island had failed to find enough natural gas to exploit.

The discovery of a gas field off the island’s southeast coast in 2011 raised the country’s hopes of becoming a regional energy player, but it must find more reserves to make a planned onshore terminal financially viable.

Energy Minister George Lakkotrypis said data from the Eni-Total venture’s exploration drilling in a different block had confirmed the existence of a natural gas reservoir within the country’s exclusive economic zone.

But “preliminary estimates show that the amount of gas discovered does not make the deposit a stand-alone project,” he added.

U.S. firm Noble Energy made the first find off the southeast coast in 2011 in the Aphrodite field, which is estimated to contain around 127.4 billion cubic metres (4.54 trillion cubic feet) of gas.

Israeli firms Delek and Avner, as well as Royal Dutch Shell, all have a stake in that block, which has been declared commercially viable.

But Italian-South Korean venture ENI-Kogas has also so far failed to discover any exploitable gas reserves in deep-sea drilling off the island.