Aramco produces first unconventional tight gas at South Ghawar

Aramco, one of the world’s largest integrated oil and petrochemical businesses, has produced the first unconventional tight gas two months ahead of schedule from its South Ghawar operational area. This discovery contributes to Aramco’s plan to expand gas production by more than half from 2021 levels through 2030, subject to domestic demand.

South Ghawar’s commissioned facilities have a raw gas processing capacity of 300 million standard cubic feet per day (scfd) and a condensate processing capacity of 38,000 barrels per day (bpd). In order to meet South Ghawar’s strategic target of supplying 750 million scfd of raw gas in the near future, the business will continue to work to more than double overall processing capacity.

“This first production of unconventional tight gas from South Ghawar is a milestone that demonstrates real progress on our gas expansion strategy, which we believe has a role to play in meeting the Kingdom’s needs for lower-emission energy and supporting growth in the chemicals sector,” said Nasir Al-Naimi, Aramco Upstream President. The ability to start production two months ahead of schedule and under budget demonstrates our people’s steadfast passion and determination to further improve our Upstream operations.”

The successful production of tight sand gas at South Ghawar constitutes Aramco’s second unconventional gas stream, following the start of production at the North Arabia field in 2018 with the supply of 240 million scfd to Wa’ad Al-Shamal customers. Work is also underway at the massive Jafurah unconventional gas field, which is the Middle East’s largest liquid-rich shale gas play.

SOURCE:https://www.aramco.com/en/news-media/news/2023/aramco-produces-first-unconventional-tight-gas-at-south-ghawar