Iraq is looking for Investor in France

Shafaq News / Iraqi Oil Minister Ihsan Ismail is visiting France to try to secure more investment in oil and energy activities in Iraq, he said in a brief statement to AFP. “We have a huge oil industry and we need more players, more competition,” Ismail told AFP. This visit “serves to meet important companies and deliver the commercial message to be more involved in the Iraqi market” he added.

“Iraq has a production capacity of 4.8 million barrels per day” and produces between 4.4 and 4.5 mbd.” “The goal is to reach 8 mbpd by the end of 2027 and to reach 5 mbpd by 2025″ said the minister. “We use about 1 million barrels and export the rest. Right now we are exporting 3.4 mbpd” he said. The stay in France, which began on Wednesday, will end on Saturday. Mr. Ismail has held meetings with officials of the French employers’ association Medef, with the CEO of the French group TotalEnergies Patrick Pouyanné, as well as Friday at the Ministry of Energy Transition, said his entourage.

TotalEnergies, which announced a $10 billion contract in Iraq in 2021, signing its return to the country where it began operations in the 1920s, did not wish to comment on this meeting. The contract signed in September covers the construction of oil gas recovery, collection and processing units at three different fields to generate electricity. The aim is also to reduce the greenhouse gas intensive practice of “flaring”, i.e. burning off the gases released during the extraction of crude oil.

The agreement also includes the construction of a high-capacity seawater treatment unit to increase water injection capacity in the fields of southern Iraq without increasing freshwater withdrawals in the country, which is under water stress, as well as the construction of a 1 GW capacity photovoltaic power plant that will supply the grid in the Basra region (south). Currently, TotalEnergies holds a 22.5% interest in the Halfaya oil field, which will produce approximately 20,000 barrels per day in TotalEnergies’ share in 2020. The group also markets lubricants in Iraq through local distributors.

Iraq, the second largest country in OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries), has immense hydrocarbon reserves, but the energy sector is undermined by decades of conflict, corruption and dilapidated facilities. It is experiencing constant power cuts that are fuelling social discontent.

(AFP)