Quite suddenly, there is remarkable oil industry news to come out of the East Mediterranean region. If the plan is executed, in the space of seven years the balance of energy security in Western Europe will be radically changed. In geopolitical terms, this will be immense; when the planned Israel-Cyprus-Greece-Italy gas pipeline is built, European countries will be able to cut their ever-increasing dependence on Russian gas supplies. The story of major gas discoveries in the East Mediterranean started in the shallow-water offshore Egypt, with Miocene Nile Delta discoveries progressively stepping out into deeper and deeper water. The first discovery was made by Phillips Petroleum in 1969, when it drilled the play-opening Abu Qir 1 NFW. It discovered gas in the Messinian Abu Madi sandstones. Subsequent exploration was led by the likes of AMOCO, BG, BP, Eni and Shell. There are now over 100 mainly gas and wet gas […]