By Lawrence Yong
Sudan’s crude oil exports, which have been knocked out for at least 15 months due to a political dispute between Sudan and South Sudan has resumed from March and may ship its first commercial cargo ship by mid June, producer Petronas said.
Crude oil production, which averaged 150,000 to 160,000 barrels per day (bpd) in the four years before the stoppage in early 2012, may hit 120,000 bpd in mid-2014.
“Production stopped in January last year and came back in March this year. It came back with 200 barrels a day and now we are ramping it up,” Petronas president and CEO Shamsul Azhar Abbas told a press conference. “As far as getting back to 120,000 barrels per day, it can still be done by middle of next year but there are challenges; technical challenges basically.”
Sudan is Petronas’ top overseas crude oil production centre. The Malaysian state oil company started pumping oil from Sudan in 2006. Petronas holds a 30% stake, China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) 40%, Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) of India 25% and Sudapet 5%.
The pipeline which draws oil from South Sudan to an export port in Sudan was shut down after a disagreement arose over charges paid and volumes exported.
The loss of production in Sudan took a big bite out of Petronas’ profits in 2012 and it may start contributing again to its bottomline from late 2013 but this would be marginal, Petronas officials said.
Previously, Petronas has said that overseas operations contributed about 42% of revenue and about 12% of profits.
For the first quarter of 2013 (1Q12), Petronas said that it saw lower overseas production from the top five countries compared to 1Q12, with aid only coming from a new production stream of 51,000 barrels of oil equivalent a day (boe/d) from Canada. Its gas production in Egypt, the Malaysia-Thailand Joint Development Area and Indonesia were down 3% to 8%. The sharpest fall was in Turkmenistan, down 19%, as the company faced difficulties in marketing its landlocked-gas supply from the Caspian Sea.
Overall, Petronas produced 462,000 boe/day in 1Q13 compared to 470,000 boe/day in 1Q12.
On its stake in Canada, through Progress Energy, which it acquired last December for US$5.7 billion, Petronas CEO Shamsul said output may be doubled from 2014. Of the 51,000 boe/day reported, about 7,000 bpd was crude oil.
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