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Qatar in 2010 sold LNG equivalent to 10.15 billion cubic feet to
Japan, and rose 56% to around 15.8 billion cubic feet in 2011. Qatar
gas also had boosted short-term LNG supplies to Japan to more than
20 million tons/year.
2-6 Saudi Arabia
In April, Saudi Aramco announced the start-up of operations of a
new gas train and sulfur recovery unit at the Khursaniyah gas plant,
which has a processing capacity of 1 billion cubic feet/day, with two
further trains to be operated soon.
Saudi Arabia started an ambitious plan for developing the
production of gas, especially in the gulf region, in addition to utilities
and its infrastructure needed for gas processing, through two projects
with a total capacity of 4.3 billion cubic feet/day by 2014. The first
one, which was announced by Saudi Aramco in July 2011, is Karan
project, the Kingdom’s first offshore non-associated three gas project,
discovered in 2006, with a capacity of 1.8 billion cubic feet/day.
Karan gas will flow into the Khursaniya gas plant where it will boost
capacity from 1 billion cubic feet/day to 2.8 billion cubic feet/day
and increase sales gas production from 560 million cubic feet/day to
1.8 billion cubic feet/day. Ethane output will also rise from 20,000
b/d to 280,000 b/d. The second project is Wasit gas plant which will
be fed by the 1.2 billion cubic feet/day, Arabiyah and the 1.3 billion
cubic feet/day Hasbah field and will produce around 1.8 billion cubic
feet/day of much needed gas for the Saudi master gas system.
