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Dolphin project to be launched next week

More than 500 officials and oil executives from the UAE and other countries will converge on the giant Qatari Ras Lafan industrial city next week for the formal inauguration of the Dolphin project, the first major trans-Gulf gas line.

Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani will launch the $4 billion (Dh14.6bn) facility, which involves the pumping of nearly two billion cubic feet of natural gas per day to the UAE and Oman. General Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces, will represent the UAE at Monday's ceremony at Ras Laffan, north of Doha.

"The project involves the transport of two billion cubic feet of natural gas from the North Field to the UAE," said Adel Bu Ainin, Dolphin Energy Director.

"Gas has already started flowing into the UAE, while around 200 million cubic feet will be supplied to Oman in mid-2008," he told Qatari newspapers.

Bu Ainin put the total cost of the project launched more than eight years ago at $4bn, making it the biggest trans-state gas pipeline project in the region. In current prices, the project's costs could have exceeded $12bn had it been launched last year or this year, according to Dolphin sources.

In a recent statement, Dolphin Energy said the project involved activity along the "entire gas value chain", adding it included the development of gas fields, the creation of new industrial zones and projects, fuelled by the power generated from gas piped from those fields.

The project involved the construction of a 364km subsea pipeline that traversed the Gulf across the shores of Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Besides the pipeline from the North Field, massive processing facilities have been built in Ras Laffan and Taweela just outside Abu Dhabi city.

Gas began flowing into Taweela last year at a rate of 1.6 billion cubic feet per day and supplies are expected to surge to two billion cubic feet per day this year. It includes around 788 million cubic feet per day for the Abu Dhabi Water and Electricity Authority, 730 mcfd for Dubai Supply Authority, 141 mcfd for Union Water and Electricity Company and 200 mcfd for Oman Oil Company. The pipeline has a capacity of nearly 3.2 billion cubic feet per day but officials said increasing supplies would depend on demand in the future.

The official said the 12-inch pipeline has a spare capacity for an additional 1.2 billion cubic feet per day.

Qatar's giant offshore North Field is the world's largest reservoir of non-associated gas, estimated at more than 900 trillion cubic feet, making the country the third largest in gas reserves after Russia and Iran.

By Nadim Kawach

© Emirates Business 24/7 2008