Flagged up: Nursultan's riches
Nursultan flows 'will hit 3m bpd'
Abu Dhabi investment vehicle Mubadala's joint venture with ConocoPhillips to develop the Nursultan Block, off Kazakhstan, could be pumping up to 3 million barrels per day in three to four years, a top executive said today.
"We could produce 1.5 million bpd to 3 million bpd in three to four years if our drilling is successful," Reuters quoted Maurizio La Noce, chief executive of oil and gas at the government owned investment fund, saying at a MEED industry conference.
ConocoPhillips and Mubadala signed a preliminary agreement last October, and then paid Kazakhstan a $100 million signing bonus a few months later, officials at the time had said.
The US supermajor and Mubadala will each hold 24.5% in the block which covers 8100 square kilometres and lies 30 kilometres off the Caspian seaport of Aktau.
The block is estimated to hold 270 million tonnes (2.1 billion barrels) of recoverable oil, according to majority owner, state-run KazMunaiGaz.
The focus of the investment company's oil and gas business would centre on the Middle East and North Africa, the Caspian and Southeast Asia, he said.
Mubadala's production was currently at 350,000 bpd, La Noce said.