LONDON – BP has pulled out of Iraq\u2019s giant Kirkuk oilfield after its $100 million exploration contract expired with no agreement on the field\u2019s expansion, dealing a fresh blow to Iraq\u2019s hopes to increase its oil output, three sources told Reuters.<\/p>\n
The move came as Western energy companies are reassessing operations in Iraq amid political turmoil following months of anti-government protests and a flare-up in tensions between the United States and Iran in the country.<\/p>\n
BP informed Iraqi authorities in December that it was removing its staff from the oilfield in the north of the country after its 2013 service contract expired at the end of 2019, the sources familiar with the matter said.<\/p>\n
A senior source at Iraq\u2019s North Oil Company (NOC), which oversees the Kirkuk operations, confirmed BP\u2019s withdrawal.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe results of its field study for Kirkuk oilfield development have been handed over to the North Oil Company and unfortunately it was below expectations\u2026 at least for us,\u201d the official said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s very obvious study results were not encouraging for BP to extend its operations,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
The Iraqi government did not reply to a request for comment.<\/p>\n
BP confirmed it had completed field work and studies and said it gave its recommendations for the development of the field to the NOC. The London-based company did not comment on staff movements.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn 2013, BP signed a letter of intent with the North Oil Company of the Iraqi Ministry of Oil to support field activity studies in Kirkuk. As planned, in December 2019 BP completed field work, studies and recommendations,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n
Another senior NOC engineer said BP staff members left their laptops with the NOC after completing the survey and technical study of the field.<\/p>\n
Iraq was hoping BP would help it triple output from the field to 1 million barrels per day (bpd) \u2014 more than one-fifth of Iraq\u2019s current production and 1% of global output.<\/p>\n
BP\u2019s contract was put on hold in 2014 when the Iraqi Army collapsed in the face of Islamic State\u2019s sweeping advance in northern and western Iraq, allowing the Kurdish regional government (KRG) to take control of the Kirkuk region.<\/p>\n
Baghdad regained full control of the deposit from the regional government in 2017 after a failed Kurdish independence referendum, at which point BP resumed its studies on the field.<\/p>\n
Kirkuk, where oil was discovered in 1927, is the birthplace of Iraq\u2019s oil industry. BP and Iraq\u2019s Oil Ministry signed in 2013 a letter of intent to study the development of the field with a planned spending of $100 million.<\/p>\n
BP\u2019s work included a 3D seismic study of the field\u2019s reservoir to expand on the existing 2D data.<\/p>\n
Kirkuk is estimated to contain about 9 billion barrels of recoverable oil, BP said.<\/p>\n
Most of Iraq\u2019s crude is produced from areas managed by the central government of Baghdad, in the south, and exported from southern ports on the Gulf. The KRG exports about 300,000 bpd of crude from northern Iraq through a pipeline across Turkey.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
LONDON – BP has pulled out of Iraq\u2019s giant Kirkuk oilfield after its $100 million exploration contract expired with no agreement on the field\u2019s expansion, dealing a fresh blow to Iraq\u2019s hopes…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4787,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,22],"tags":[46,48,57,68,76,77,82,86,87,90,96,99,103,107,109,111,113,137,139,146,148,160,174,183,184,201,202,209,222,230,232,233,244,246,249,256,262,263,267,277,279,280,285,288],"class_list":["post-4781","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy","category-oil-gas","tag-aramco","tag-athens","tag-baroudi","tag-carbon","tag-climate","tag-climate-change","tag-co2","tag-cyprus","tag-decarbonising","tag-democracy","tag-doha","tag-eastmed","tag-egypt","tag-embargo","tag-emissions","tag-energy","tag-energy-peace","tag-gas","tag-gazprom","tag-greece","tag-greenenergy","tag-international-maritime-disputes","tag-lebanon","tag-maritime-boundaries-east-mediterranean","tag-maritime-disputes","tag-offshore","tag-oil","tag-opec","tag-pollution","tag-poverty-alleviation","tag-putin","tag-qatar","tag-rosneft","tag-roudi","tag-russia","tag-saudi","tag-solar","tag-solar-power","tag-straddling-hydrocarbons-reserves","tag-total","tag-trump","tag-turkey","tag-unclos","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4781"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4781\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}