Kuwait announces first-ever discovery of natural gas

Kuwait today announced it had discovered natural gas for the first time, in commercial quantities, as well as a new light oil.

“We have found ... for the first time in Kuwait very encouraging quantities of ‘free’ gas,” Energy Minister Sheikh Ahmed Fahd Al Ahmed Al Sabah said.

He said the reservoir was 35 trillion cubic feet, and that studies have proven 60 to 70 percent of it is recoverable.

Sheikh Ahmed also told reporters that some 10 to 13 billion barrels of light crude have been discovered.

The discoveries were made in five fields in northern Kuwait.

The state-owned Kuwait Oil Company said in a statement that the initial phases of actual natural gas production will commence by the end of 2007, after completion of the necessary surface facilities.