Peninsula On-line

Doha, Mar 7: A deepwater pipeline corridor designed to transport large quantities of natural gas economically from the Gulf region to India, straight across the Indian Ocean is now feasible.

South Asia Gas Enterprise (SAGE) Technical Director, Peter Roberts said in his presentation at a gas summit here yesterday the economics of a family of SAGE deepwater pipeline system are attractive and the risks are now demonstrably low.

The depth of the Indian Ocean along this route was beyond the economic pipe-lay limit until the mid-1990s, when the enabling technology was developed and a deepwater Code of Design Practice was issued to the industry, he said.

Every year since then, pipe has been laid into deeper and deeper water, past 2,000m depth and now up to around 3,000m, following the progress of the oil and gas industry into new areas, further offshore.

Roberts said the target installation date for the SAGE pipeline, just past the turn of the decade, will see the industry working at depths beyond the 3,500m that the SAGE line reaches. "This, indeed, is a project whose time has come," he said.

The 13th Annual Middle East Gas Summit concluded here yesterday with the final sessions devoted to prospects of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and gas projects from the Middle East.

Oman Gas Company Development Director, Maktoom Al Matani gave in his presentation an overview of current status and future plans for gas in Oman at a session which addressed market risks in a changing LNG world and issues related to exploring alternative mitigation strategies for MENA projects.

He spoke of the challenges facing the sector, which involves meeting vast growth of gas demand in the country and trying to keep up with the dynamic change in business environment as well as continuing to maintain and prolong the life cycle of the facilities.

Obindah Wagbara of the Centre for Energy, Petroleum and Mineral Law and Policy of the University of Dundee in the U K questioned in his paper the extent to which a liquid market for Exchange -traded LNG contracts is feasible.

The paper titled 'To what extent is a liquid LNG hub in the Middle East is Feasible?" showed that a robust and effective mechanism for determining price is necessary to attract many players and achieve liquidity.

International Energy Consultations Enterprise (IECE) Principal, Engineer Azmi Al Said Khreisat talked about the Arab Gas Pipeline project which is to transport Egyptian natural gas to Jordan, Syria and Lebanon in the first phase.

The project will be further expanded to allow Iraq and other major gas producers in the region to supply East Mediterranean markets and to ultimately export their natural gas to Europe.

The Institute of Petroleum Management Director, Arbinda Tripathy for India addressed in the session the issue of managerial manpower need of the oil and gas sector.

Tripathy stressed the need for petro-managers to address effectively the issues related to the sector. He said the response so far has largely been in the area of executive education of managers in the oil and gas sector.

He said close association and supportive role of industry is key to the success in setting up an academic institute to fulfill the need of managerial manpower at all levels, starting with the entry level.