Eni SpA and Libya’s National Oil Corp (NOC) have started up a compression project that improves natural gas recovery in the Bahr Essalam field off the Mediterranean coast of the North African country.
“The new compressors are expected to boost production by approximately 28 billion cubic feet of natural gas annually and to increase condensate output by about 360,000 barrels per year”, NOC said in a press release Monday.
“The resulting production increases were routed to the Mellitah-Misrata coastal pipeline, supporting gas supplies to power plants. This helps maintain operational pressures and required volumes, ensuring the stability and long-term sustainability of gas deliveries to a range of consumers”, NOC added.
The project installed a new 1,600-ton multi-train compression module on the Sabratha platform, providing a total compression capacity of about 440 million cubic feet a day, according to Italy’s state-backed Eni.
“The new module enables production under low-pressure conditions, offsetting the natural decline of the Bahr Essalam field and maximizing gas recovery, ensuring increased volumes of gas of about 800 million cubic meters [28.25 billion cubic feet] per year and associated condensate”, it said separately.
Eni added the project enables more export to Italy via the Greenstream pipeline, a 516-kilometer (320.63 miles) conveyor under Mediterranean waters that carries gas from Zwara to Sicily.
Eni and NOC each own 50 percent in Bahr Essalam and Greenstream.
“Two additional strategic projects are presently in execution in the country: Bouri Gas Utilization Project, whose tie-in and commissioning activities are currently underway after the recent installation of the Bouri Gas Recovery Module, and Structures A&E, whose execution is underway to develop two offshore gas fields”, Eni added Monday.
“Eni has been present in Libya since 1959 and is the country’s leading international operator, with an equity production of approximately 162,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day in 2025 and three development projects currently in execution for a total investment of about 10 billion dollars”.
Last week Libya reached its highest daily oil production since 2013, recording 1.44 million barrels per day (MMbpd).
The milestone brings Libya closer to its goal of 1.5 MMbpd of crude production by yearend. Under its 2023-27 plan, NOC set a target of 2 MMbpd, as announced by the company March 30, 2023.
“Condensate production also hit 49,163 barrels per day, bringing total daily output to 1,487,723 barrels”, NOC said in an online statement June 21.